Greetings and welcome!  I retired officially from the regular University of Washington faculty at the end of 2011 and am now Professor Emeritus of Epidemiology and Health Services.  I no longer have an active research program or classroom teaching duties.  I do continue to advise a few individual graduate students who plan to finish their doctorate in early 2012.

Research

   Before retiring, my main research areas were injury epidemiology, neuroepidemiology, veterans health, application of epidemiology to evaluation of health services, and epidemiologic methods.  See my curriculum vitae for a list of publications related to those and other earlier research areas.

Teaching

    Colleague Noel Weiss and I co-created the EPI 512 - EPI 513 course series, Epidemiologic Methods I and II, in the mid-1980s, and I co-taught it through 2011.  Victoria Holt joined us as a co-instructor several years ago and is now the lead instructor of both courses.  Noel and I co-authored Epidemiologic Methods: Studying the Occurrence of Illness, published by Oxford University Press in 2003, which is the main textbook for the EPI 512-513 series and is used in similar courses elsewhere.  Work is currently underway on a second edition.

Computing

   I have used computers extensively throughout my career since working as a professional computer programmer before and during medical school.  As a researcher and classroom teacher, I developed my own preferences for favorite software, most of which is open-source and in the public domain.

Non-professional interests

• Being one member of a 6-person book club, now in its 26th year, for which I serve as club historian.
  
  
• A more-than-casual interest in art history.  I completed a 6-year project from 2002-2007, spending one year studying Western art from each century from the 15th century through the 20th.  One spin-off from the project was serving as the art cover commentator for Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, which resulted in a series of short essays on different art works related to the lives of children.  Another by-product was a computer-based pictorial companion to Giorgio Vasari's Lives of the Painters, which was one of our book club selections.  Yet another was a special seminar, An Epidemiologist Looks at Art, which was presented to the UW Department of Epidemiology and from which the text and a slightly sanitized version of the slides are available for viewing.
  
  
• Last year I began trying to learn how to play the viola--a considerable challenge, but I enjoy it quite a lot and am making progress with the help of good teachers.
  
  

Retirement plans

• Update Noel's and my textbook on epidemiologic methods
• Spend more time with my lovely wife, Kathie
  
• Travel: India, New Zealand, Norway, Italy...
• Attend more performing arts and visual arts events
• Stay healthy
  
• Seek opportunities for meaningful volunteer work
• Keep learning how to play the viola
• Attend selected classes at UW: music, economics, mathematics, art history
  
• Work on overdue house projects
• Read great books
  
  

Contact information

    E-mail: koepsell@u.washington.edu

    Regular mail: 116 NW 60th Street, Seattle, WA 98107

    I no longer have an office on the UW campus.