PhD
Associate Professor, Health Policy and Management
UNC-Chapel Hill
Cancer Prevention and Control Research Program
Area of Interest
I am an Associate Professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management and co-direct the Implementation Science Methods Unit at the NC Translational and Clinical Sciences Institute (“NC TraCS,” UNC’s Clinical and Translational Science Award from NIH). As a health services researcher and implementation scientist, my research identifies important gaps in implementing evidence-based practices (e.g., patient-reported outcome measures ([PROMs]) as a standard of care and how those gaps are related to poor patient and clinic outcomes. I teach two graduate courses (one per year) in the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health: 1) Patient-reported outcome measures and application in care delivery and research (course code: HPM 794); and 2) Implementation science in health (course code: HPM 767). My research program has been funded by NIH, PCORI, AHRQ, Pfizer, Sivan Innovation, Urogen, and foundations. My work has significantly influenced the field with >80 peer-reviewed publications that have been cited more than 8,500 times. My grant from Pfizer (with MPI Debbie Liang, PharmD) is testing implementation outcomes for a novel oncology care model where clinical oncology pharmacists serve as PROM monitors instead of oncologists and nurses.
Awards and Honors
- Inducted into Sigma Xi, 2025
- Board of Directors (elected) for the International Society for Quality of Life Research (ISOQOL), 2024-2027
- Plenary speaker, International Society for Quality of Life Research, Koln, Germany, 2024 Keynote speaker,
- Province of Alberta PROMs conference, Alberta, Canada, 2023
- Steering Committee for PROTEUS-Practice’s dissemination effort for implementing patient reported outcome measures in Clinical Practice (funded by Pfizer), 2020
- Finalist for “Best paper of the year” award, Quality of Life Research journal, 2022
- World-ranked expert in patient outcome assessment (top 0.1% in PROMs), 2021-present
- Emerging Leader Award, International Society for Quality of Life research (ISOQOL), 2020
- Innovation Award, UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, 2020-2022
- UNC Provost Award for Junior Faculty, 2020-2021
- World-ranked expert in quality of life research, Expertscape, 2019-present
- Michael S. O’Malley Alumni Award for Publication Excellence in Cancer Population Sciences, UNC-Chapel Hill, 2017
- Merit awardee, Conquer Cancer Foundation, 2016
News and Stories
Investigating approaches to make lung cancer screening more effective
To better understand the burdens of false-positive lung cancer screenings and ways to mitigate them, the NCI awarded UNC Lineberger researchers a $3.2 million grant to identify the potential harms of false-positive results at the patient, clinician, and facility levels.
Electronic reporting of symptoms by cancer patients can improve quality of life and reduce emergency visits
The PRO-TECT randomized clinical trial was conducted to assess the real-world impact of electronic patient-reported outcomes symptom monitoring on clinical outcomes compared to usual care.
