Meet the team – Sara Masoud
My name is Sara Masoud and I’m part of the Caring for the Caregiver team. My job involves partnering with people in the community to make programs and research that matters to them.
I moved to San Antonio from El Paso, Texas in 2018 when the program was just getting started. Before I moved here I was working, studying, and caregiving with my sisters and mother for my grandfather who was living with dementia. I loved being part of his care team, even when it would get really difficult.
As the Community Outreach Coordinator for Caring for the Caregiver, I’m always trying to connect and partner with communities to plan programs that are interesting and helpful to people living with dementia and family caregivers. You may know me if you’ve ever been to one of our SA Amigos Memory Café gatherings, a monthly event where we enjoy social activities that bring people together in a dementia friendly and inclusive way.
I studied sociology in my undergraduate degree at the University of Texas at El Paso and then went on to get a master’s in public health degree from the UT Houston Health Science Center. Having grown up in a Palestinian household with immigrant family members while living in a border community, I’ve always been deeply committed to understanding and addressing health equity disparities. I spent my time in grad school working with a local immigrant advocacy center to get a sense of what health issues were prevalent in their community that could be proactively addressed by their organization.
In Fall 2020 I started my PhD at the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in Translational Science. My research is focused on engaging with communities impacted by dementia so they can lead research that is important to them. I’m currently focused on a project to partner with Latino communities of South Texas to identify dementia care research topics and to create resources that promote better representation of Latinos in research about their care.
My favorite part of my job and my studies is getting to collaborate with and learn from family caregivers and persons living with dementia. When I’m not working or studying, I am spending time outside in the Texas sun with my dog or being ridiculously silly with my niece and nephew.
You can reach me any time through email at masoud@uthscsa.edu, calling or you can even send me a text at 210-787-2815.