Research
Overview
The unifying theme of my research is accessible personalized medicine. In today’s increasingly high-tech world, personalized medicine often conjures thoughts of advanced proteomics and targeted gene therapy. However, missed opportunities abound to improve the accessibility and delivery of diagnostics and therapeutics we already know work. As such, my teams' work focus on the design and implementation of evidence-based, cost-effective diagnostic and therapeutic options. My teams include the active participation of medical students and residents, as well as interprofessional faculty collaborators.
My two main areas of interest are olfaction and pain. We have developed the Affordable, Rapid, Olfactory Measurement Array (AROMA). Olfaction is highly conserved and important not just for pleasure, quality of life, and danger avoidance, but also for brain health. It is well established in the literature that olfaction is adversely impacted by varied disease states ranging from allergic rhinitis, chronic rhinosinusitis, and laryngectomy patients to neurocognitive disorders like traumatic brain injury, Parkinson’s Disease, and Alzheimer’s Disease. We have received multiple grants to support this research. We are continuing to validate AROMA in specific populations of interest and believe our work will allow for more patients to have access to a validated olfactory test to provide personalized, objective data that can aid in not only diagnosis but monitoring of clinical progression and treatment response.
The widespread desire for a functional pain scale has not resulted in an easy to use, and interpret, pain scale. To fill this gap, our team has created a customizable pain scale that links pain to functional activities. We have created customized pain scales for multiple surgical procedures such as cystectomy and radical prostatectomy, transoral robotic surgery, hypoglossal nerve stimulator placement, and hip replacement. Validating studies are ongoing in these surgical cohorts. Initial data shows that the ABCs correlates more strongly with outpatient opioid needs than the 0-10 scale. Activity Based Checks of Pain – Functional Pain Scale (ABCs of Pain). We are also conducting focus groups to better understand pain management perspectives. Our goal is to determine the value of the ABCs for pain management decision-making for both patients and clinicians.
Our teams have been successful, receiving multiple grants. In the past two years, my medical students have received four funded research fellowships, numerous awards at the KUMC Student Research Forum, and both poster and podium presentations at national conferences.
