Recognition November/December 2022


CCHE presents at American Evaluation Association

Recognition_AEA-group-selfie_1col-x-plus.jpgThe American Evaluation Association's annual conference in New Orleans featured 3 presentations from the Center for Community Health and Evaluation (CCHE) at Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute (KPWHRI).

Elena Noon Kuo, PhD, MPH, collaborated on a presentation for a session on achieving equity through technology. The talk was about increasing colorectal cancer screening among Hispanic and low-income patients through texting and a fotonovela comic.

Maggie Jones, MPH, Kuo, and Lisa Schafer, MPH, spoke at a session on incorporating equity into evaluation. They presented an equity, diversity, and inclusion discussion guide created by CCHE and shared lessons from developing and implementing the guide.

Schafer, Jones, and Monika Sanchez, MSc, spoke at a session on combining trauma-informed care and evaluation. The team shared lessons from evaluating this growing field and discussed trauma-informed evaluation practice in general.

Lewis on Highly Cited Researchers list for 2022

Cara Lewis, PhD, KPWHRI senior investigator, is one of the most influential researchers for 2022, based on citations of her research. Each year, the research services company Clarivate releases a list of the most highly cited researchers over the last decade. The company notes that in 2022, the list included fewer than 7,000 — or about 0.1% — of the world's researchers. Congratulations, Cara!

Gatto joins KPWHRI

Nicole Gatto, PhD, MPH, is now a principal collaborative scientist at KPWHRI, working mainly on the Adult Changes in Thought (ACT) Study. Gatto's previous research includes studies on neurological and cardiovascular diseases and cancers, focused on environmental health. She has extensive experience teaching in global and community health and epidemiology at Claremont Graduate University and Loma Linda University, among other institutions. With Fulbright funding, Gatto has worked in Mongolia, Iceland, and Columbia. Among many service projects, she founded the Milagro Allegro Community Garden in Los Angeles. Welcome, Nicole!

ACT Center wins an AcademyHealth Challenge Contest

At the AcademyHealth Annual Research Meeting in Washington, D.C., this summer, the Center for Accelerating Care Transformation (ACT Center) at KPWHRI was a winner in a contest about overcoming challenges for research embedded in health systems. The Integrated Pain Management team, represented by Paula Lozano, MD, MPH, who presented for Claire Allen, MPH, was invited to discuss their work engaging health system leaders, clinicians, and patients in strategies for managing chronic pain.

Lewis and Brown speak to Kaiser Permanente

In November, KPWHRI Senior Investigator Cara Lewis, PhD, and Collaborative Scientist Meagan Brown, PhD, MPH, gave a webinar to the Kaiser Permanente Care Improvement Research Team. Lewis presented an overview of Kaiser Permanente's Social Needs Network for Evaluation and Translation (SONNET). Brown spoke about a web-based continuing medical education course to support adjustment as part of Kaiser Permanente's social health integration.

KPWHRI presents at Data Con

In November, Kaiser Permanente Washington held Data Con, an annual event to share knowledge and expertise around working with data. Presenting from KPWHRI were John Weeks on research code management, Kristin Delaney on Excel pivot tables for National Institutes of Health enrollment reports, Chris Stewart on safety planning for suicide prevention, Lawrence Madziwa on medical text deidentification aid, and Roy Pardee on using GEMS, SAS, and JavaScript.

Ryan speaks to American Public Health Association

Taylor Ryan, MS, presented at the American Public Health Association Meeting in Boston in November. Ryan is a KPWHRI research consultant and a University of Washington PhD student in the Department of Health Systems and Population Health. Ryan's presentation, “Evaluation of Integrated Mental Health in Primary Care for Supporting Suicide Risk Identification,” was part of a roundtable on suicide prevention. Coauthors were KPWHRI researchers Julie Richards, PhD, MPH, Maricela Cruz, PhD, Chris Stewart, PhD, and Greg Simon, MD, MPH.