Henry Xiang, MD, MPH, PhD, MBA
Professor
(Courtesy)
Epidemiology
Biography
Dr. Henry Xiang is an internationally recognized physician-scientist and clinical translational science expert whose work bridges population health, medicine and digital innovation. He is professor of medicine and epidemiology at The Ohio State University, co-director of the Pilot Translational and Clinical Studies Program at the NIH-funded Clinical and Translational Science Institute, and director of the Center for Pediatric Trauma Research and director of research at the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital.
Dr. Xiang’s research focuses on injury and violence prevention, trauma outcomes, disability and rehabilitation, and acute and chronic pain, with particular emphasis on causal inference, data science, artificial intelligence and medical extended reality. He is internationally known for pioneering triplet and poly-matching causal-inference frameworks for evaluating multi-arm interventions in trauma care and public health, as well as for leading clinical trials of digital extended reality for pediatric pain management, anxiety, and brain-injury rehabilitation.
His work has informed national and global policy, including contributions to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Healthy People 2020 Disability and Health objectives, the World Health Organization’s World Report on Disability, and the development of NIH pediatric injury research priorities that informed creation of NICHD's Pediatric Trauma and Critical Illness Branch. He has held numerous national and international leadership roles, including president of the Society for Advancement of Violence and Injury Research (SAVIR) and founder and inaugural president of the Global Association for Pediatric Extended Reality.
Dr. Xiang has received more than 56 externally funded grants from NIH, CDC, AHRQ, HRSA, WHO and other agencies, and has authored nearly 300 peer-reviewed publications. His honors include awards from German Medical Association, American Public Health Association, SAVIR, and HIMSS North America. In 2025, Dr. Xiang was elected an inaugural fellow of both SAVIR and the American Medical Extended Reality Association.
Education
- MBA
- Ohio State University, 2021
- PhD
- Colorado State University, 2000
- MPH
- Tongji Medical University, 1991
- MD
- Tongji Medical University, 1988
Research interests
Injury and violence prevention, trauma outcomes, disability and rehabilitation, and acute and chronic pain, causal inference, data science, artificial intelligence, and medical extended reality.
Select publications
- Xiang H, Stallones L, Chen G, Hostetler SG, Kelleher K. Nonfatal injuries among U.S. children with disabling conditions. American Journal Public Health. 2005; 95(11):1970–1975.
- Xiang H, Shi J, Lu B, Wheeler K, Stallones L, Smith GA. Medical expenditures associated with nonfatal occupational injuries among immigrant and U.S.-born workers. BMC Public Health. 2012;12:678.
- Price J, Shi J, Lu B, Smith GA, Stallones L, Wheeler K, Xiang H. Non-occupational and occupational injuries to U.S. workers with disability. Am J Public Health 2012; 102(9):e38-46.
- Stanley RM, Bonsu BK, Zhao W, Ehrlich PF, Rogers AJ, Xiang H. U.S. estimates of hospitalized children with severe traumatic brain injury: implications for clinical trials. Pediatrics. 2012; 129(1):e24–30.
- Shi J, Lu B, Wheeler KK, Xiang H. Unmeasured confounding in observational studies with multiple treatment arms: comparing emergency-department mortality of severe trauma patients by trauma-center level. Epidemiology. 2016; 27(5):624–632.
- Nattino G, Lu B, Shi J, Lemeshow S, Xiang H. Triplet matching for estimating causal effects with three treatment arms: a comparative study of mortality by trauma-center level. Journal of the American Statistical Association. 2021; 116(533):44–53.
- Shi J, Shen J, Caupp S, Wang A, Nuss KE, Kenney B, Wheeler K, Lu B, Xiang H. A new weighted injury-severity scoring system: better predictive power for pediatric trauma mortality. J Trauma Acute Care Surg. 2018; 85(2):334–340.
- Xiang H, Shen J, Wheeler KK, Patterson J, Lever K, Armstrong M, Shi J, Thakkar R, Groner J, Noffsinger D, Giles SA, Fabia RB. Smartphone virtual reality distraction for management of pediatric burn pain: A randomized clinical trial. JAMA Network Open. 2021;4(6):e2112082.
- Jain S, Armstrong M, Luna J, Thakkar R, Fabia R, Groner J, Noffsinger D, Ni A, Nelson E, Xiang H. Features of virtual reality impact effectiveness of VR pain-alleviation therapeutics in pediatric burn patients. PLOS Digit Health. 2024; 3(1):e0000440.
- Schneider M, Woodworth A, Ericson M, Boerger L, Denne S, Dillon P, Duguid P, Ghanem E, Hunt J, Li J, McCoy R, Prokofieva N, Rodriguez V, Sparks C, Zaleski J, Xiang H. Distinguishing between Translational Science and Translational Research in CTSA Pilot Studies; A Collaborative Project Across 12 CTSA Hubs. Journal of Clinical and Translational Science. 2024; 8(1):e4.