Rebecca Brown, MD, MPH                                                 
Assistant Professor – Medicine
School of Medicine
Pilot for Early Career Investigators
(formerly: Pilot for Junior Investigators in Basic and Clinical/Translational Sciences)
 Low Socioeconomic Status and Premature Functional Impairment

Awarded $ 40K – Spring, 2017

• How did the RAP grant allow for further funding and/or publications?
  Functional impairment – i.e., difficulty performing basic daily activities like bathing and dressing – affects 15% of middle-aged adults, and this prevalence is increasing. While a large body of research has looked at the epidemiology and outcomes of functional impairment that develops in older adults (ages 65+), much less is known about its impacts on middle-aged people (ages 45-64).
  
  RAP funding allowed us to expand our work focused on understanding the risk factors and outcomes of functional impairment in middle age to examine how the characteristics of these impairments differ in middle-aged versus older adults. In a study published in the Journals of Gerontology and supported by RAP funding, we showed that the order in which different impairments develop differs in middle-aged versus older adults. For example, difficulty transferring develops more commonly in middle-aged people, whereas difficulty bathing develops more commonly in older adults. These findings have implications for the development of age-specific interventions to prevent or delay functional impairment.

• What was the type of follow-up funding since the initial RAP award?
  The RAP award provided key preliminary data for an R01 award examining late-life outcomes associated with functional impairment that develops in middle age.

• What is the focus of your research today?
  My current research as an Assistant Professor in Geriatric Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, focuses on understanding why aging-related syndromes such as functional impairment and cognitive impairment develop relatively early in some middle-aged adults and how to intervene to improve quality of life and outcomes for these populations. I have a particular focus on socioeconomically vulnerable populations including people experiencing homelessness and understanding how housing-based interventions can help improve function and allow people to live comfortably and independently in their homes and communities over time.

 

Katrina Kimport, PhD                                                            
Assistant Professor – Bixby Center for Global Reproductive Health
School of Medicine
Pilot for Early Career Investigators
(formerly: Pilot for Junior Investigators in Basic and Clinical/Translational Sciences)
 Assessing Pregnancy Intentions in the Contraceptive Counseling Visit

Awarded $ 39K – Spring, 2017

• How did the RAP grant allow for further funding and/or publications?
  The 2017 RAP grant allowed me to complete data analysis on a dataset of contraceptive counseling visits to investigate how patient-provider interaction constructs the importance of pregnancy intentions—and the effect of that construction on contraceptive method selection. The findings resulted in two conference presentations and one manuscript currently under review at a sociology journal. I was also able to leverage the pilot findings to secure external funding.

• What was the type of follow-up funding since the initial RAP award?
  I secured a grant from a private foundation to continue the project the RAP award initially supported.

• What is the focus of your research today?
  I continue to study reproductive health and, more specifically, the patient experience of reproductive healthcare and decision making.

 

               

Susan Lynch, PhD      Suzanne Sharpton, MD                                 
Professor – Medicine
School of Medicine
Pilot for Established Investigators
 Dysbiosis of the Inter-kingdom Gut Microbiota: Implications for Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease Severity

Awarded $ 29K – Spring, 2017

• How did the RAP grant allow for further funding and/or publications?
  This RAP award permitted a then gastroenterology fellow, Dr. Suzanne Sharpton to build a well-characterized cohort of bariatric surgery patients to assess the role of the gut microbiome and its metabolic products in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). The award permitted Suzanne to develop skill in human microbiome research, publish several related manuscripts and secure additional funding for her research program. She has been a co-author on several articles in the NEJM as part of the NASH Clinical Research Network (CRN). After her gastroenterology fellowship at UCSF, she subsequently secured a faculty position and has developed her own research group at the University of California San Diego.

• What was the type of follow-up funding since the initial RAP award?
  Dr. Sharpton secured start-up funds and additional intramural funding to expand her NAFLD research program.

• What is the focus of your research today?
  Dr. Sharpton remains focused on the microbiome and NAFLD and nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and has published several additional articles, including a manuscript demonstrating that a gut metagenomic-derived signature predicts hepatic decompensation and mortality in NASH-related cirrhosis, published in May 2022.

• Any additional/final comments:
  This award helped an extremely talented fellow build out a successful research platform which has allowed her to launch her own independent research program.

 

Sarah Roberts, DrPH                                                             
Professor – Obstetrics/Gynecology, Reproductive Sciences
School of Medicine
One-Year Innovation Award in Prematurity Research
 Drug use and pregnancy policy study (D-APPS)

Awarded $ 50K – Spring, 2017

• How did the RAP grant allow for further funding and/or publications?
  As part of an administrative supplement to an existing R01, we received funding to conduct policy surveillance of pregnancy-specific drug policies, such as those defining drug use during pregnancy as child abuse/neglect and those requiring health care providers to report pregnant/birthing people who use drugs to government agencies. The RAP grant supported us to analyze these data, publish finding, and create issue briefs and other tools to disseminate our finding to key policy-influencing audiences. We published one specific manuscript based on these data: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0091450918790790
  
  Additionally, the RAP grant allowed us to demonstrate the importance of conducting the policy surveillance of the pregnancy-specific drug policies and not only the pregnancy-specific alcohol policies. We have a subsequent R01 that includes additional support for ongoing policy surveillance as well as examination of outcomes associated with some of these policies.

• What was the type of follow-up funding since the initial RAP award?
  I am a PI of a subsequent R01 grant that allows us to continue examining effects of pregnancy-specific alcohol and drug policies, as well as general population alcohol policies. I am also a PI of a California Department of Cannabis Control grant for which we are conducting a mixed methods study related to one of the pregnancy-specific drug policies addressing Mandatory Warning Signs for cannabis use during pregnancy that we first explored as part of the initial RAP award.

• What is the focus of your research today?
  I continue to research the health-related effects of pregnancy-specific alcohol and drug policies, as well as the public health aspects of abortion policies.

• Any additional/final comments:
  I thank this seed funding Program for the support of my research.

 

Justin White, PhD, MSPH                                                    
Associate Professor – Institute for Health Policy Studies
School of Medicine
Global Cancer Pilot Award
Commitment Contracts and School Competition for Smoking Prevention in Indonesia

Awarded $ 48K – Spring, 2017

• How did the RAP grant allow for further funding and/or publications?
  The RAP award enabled us to collect additional follow-up assessment data in our randomized evaluation of a smoking prevention program in Indonesia. The study was recently published in the Journal of Health Economics. An overview of the study is available on this page. Our main finding was that a non-monetary, school-based incentive program reduced the probability that adolescents smoked, with effects sustained several months after the program ended.

• What was the type of follow-up funding since the initial RAP award?
  Since the initial RAP award, I have received funding from the National Cancer Institute for a related trial. 

• What is the focus of your research today?
  My research focuses on evaluating interventions and policies that reduce chronic disease risk, with an emphasis on tobacco use and nutrition. The interventional work focuses on incentive-based interventions for health promotion, such as the one tested using the RAP funding. The policy evaluation work focuses on the health effects of a variety of social and economic policies, such as health product taxes and poverty alleviation programs. 

• Any additional/final comments:
  The RAP program provides critical early-stage funding to UCSF investigators, and I count myself as very fortunate to have been a recipient.