The Expert earned her Sc.D. in Collective Health from the Federal Medical School of São Paulo. Her research was the Bolivian immigrant women’s experiences in motherhood and family healthcare in São Paulo, Brazil. She has an M.A. in Latin American Studies from the University of Texas at Austin. Her Master’s thesis was an institutional ethnography on the perceptions and treatments of the sexuality and sexual abuse of people with intellectual disabilities and mental illnesses in urban Guatemala.
The Expert has multiple international and domestic publications and has conducted fieldwork in the United States, Guatemala and Brazil. Her areas of specialization include: the social determinants of health, health systems and policies, immigrant healthcare, intercultural healthcare, primary healthcare access, healthcare and disability, transnational motherhood, sexual violence, domestic violence, ethnography and qualitative research methods.
LGBTQI issues; child abuse; sexual abuse/assault; gender-based violence/domestic violence; human trafficking; Likelihood of destitution or homelessness; ethnic, religious, or tribal discrimination or persecution; risk of torture or political persecution; risk from state actors, risk from non-state actors; risk of retaliation; sufficiency of protection; possibility of safe internal relocation; healthcare access; health systems capacity; mental illness; HIV/AIDS; specialized medical services; disability services access; rights of people with disabilities
Experience working with refugees and asylum-seekers in Latin America.
Serrano, S. & Martin, D. (2021). "Immigration, Disability and Healthcare Access in Brazil" Disability Studies Quarterly, 41 (2).
Serrano, S. (2013). "Dumps For Humans: the institutionalization and citizenship of people with intellectual and psychiatric disabilities in Guatemala." International Journal of Disability, Community & Rehabilitation, 12(2).
Serrano, S. (2009). Femicide in Guatemala and Ciudad Juárez: The underlying causes that have spurred an international phenomenon. The Oracle, 1(1), 53–64.
Carabantes Soto, A., Demarchi Villalón, C. E., Riba Hernández, E., Moya Aramayo, J., Tascón Bejarano, L. E., Pizzaro Sippa, M., Serrano, S., Morales, S., & Chang Waldman, T. (2020). Migraciones: Realidades, Luchas y Resistencias [MigrationsL Realities, Struggles and Resistance]. Red Jubileo Sur/ Américas.
Spanish- Near Native, Full Working Proficiency
Portuguese- Near Native, Full Working Proficiency
French- Beginner