Research Initiatives

Faculty

Numerous faculty within the department have a primary interest in research blended with their clinical and teaching responsibilities. Noted below are the research faculty with administrative responsibilities for the research mission of the department (Linda Weinreb, MD, Carole Upshur, EdD and Judy Savageau, MPH), followed (alphabetically) by research faculty with on-going projects.

Linda Weinreb, MD, Vice Chair for Research and Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health, is a nationally recognized expert on the health and support needs of homeless families. Dr. Weinreb has extensive expertise in the development, implementation, and evaluation of service interventions that integrate behavioral health and support services with primary health care for homeless and low income housed families. Her epidemiologic and intervention studies with homeless and other vulnerable populations have helped to define the health needs of homeless mothers and children, impacted state and federal policy, and substantially informed clinical practice, program design, and program replication across the country. Dr. Weinreb also has substantial expertise in approaches to integrate mental health care into primary health care settings, having conducted funded research from the National Institute of Mental Health, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Her current work is focused on integrating mental health and substance abuse services with primary care for homeless women and families, and other vulnerable groups. Additionally, she continues to conduct epidemologic studies with homeless families and is completing a Worcester-based study examining factors associated with homeless shelter exit time for families.

Carole Upshur, EdD, Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health and Associate Dean, Graduate School of Biomedical Services, has over 30 years of experience as an evaluation and policy researcher in the areas of education, mental health, disability, and health care. She has conducted funded research from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Agency for Health Care Quality and Research, the Health Services Research Association, and the National Institute of Mental Health in recent years. Most of her current work is focused on managing chronic illness such as depression, diabetes, substance abuse, and chronic pain in primary care. She has expertise in developing training and quality improvement materials for both providers and patients, as well as implementing QI in primary care. She has an ongoing community study on prevention of behavior problems in young children enrolled in preschool programs. She also serves as an academic partner to the New England Clinician's Forum, a primary care Practice Based Research Network (PBRN) consisting of sites in six states providing care to the underserved, as well as to the Health Care for the Homeless PBRN which has 35 sites nationally.

Judy Savageau, MPH, Associate Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health, is an epidemiologist and biostatistician with over 25 years of experience in a variety of investigations of community-based, public health issues. She splits her time between the Department and the medical school's Center for Health Policy and Research. Her particular interests include the identification of factors related to the utilization of health care and compliance with preventive health measures. The relationship between these outcomes and the development of programs to improve the quality of medical care are a focus for her research endeavors - especially as they relate to medical education and faculty development efforts. In addition to her research activities, she spends considerable time teaching at the medical school as the director for a course in Epidemiology and Biostatistics as well as co-directing the Senior Scholars Program.

Teresa Anderson, PhD, MSW, Instructor of Family Medicine and Community Health, is an Associate Director of the Evaluation and Measurement Unit at the Center for Health Policy and Research. Terri brings extensive public health experience to her role where she is responsible for projects addressing medication errors in nursing homes, the introduction of a new MassHealth benefit, and the electronic verification of citizenship for program eligibility. Prior to joining CHPR in 2008, Dr. Anderson was director of the Office of Statistics and Evaluation in the Massachusetts Department of Public Health's (MDPH) Bureau of Substance Abuse Services (BSAS) and Bureau of Community Health Access and Promotion. In this capacity, she participated in high-level state government policy discussions, including the signing of an interagency data use agreement. She also directed the MDPH segment of the Massachusetts Youth Health Survey/Youth Risk Behavior Survey interagency project with the Department of Education. She sits on several evalution advisory panels and is part of the Washington Circle Public Sector performance measures group.

Lucy Candib, MD, Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health, was in the first graduating class of the Worcester Family Practice Residency in 1976 and has been a faculty member practicing, teaching, and conducting research at the Family Health Center of Worcester for over 33 years. Within the context of long-term doctor-patient relationships, she has put feminist principles to work in a multicultural setting. Dr. Candib has also focused attention on the concerns of women trainees and practitioners, and has lectured widely on the topics of sexual abuse and violence against women. The author of numerous articles, Dr. Candib has introduced a feminist critique of medical theory in her book, Medicine and the Family: A Feminist Perspective. In 1995 she won a Fulbright grant to teach family medicine in Ecuador and she continued her involvement with Ecuador as a Fulbright Senior Specialist in 2004. In 2001, she was the first department faculty member to adopt group visit methodology for working with people with diabetes and continues to conduct groups in English and Spanish. She is an active member of the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine and is on the steering committee of the Wonca Working Party on Women and Family Medicine.

Suzanne Cashman, ScD, Associate Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health and Director of Community Health, is trained as a health services researcher and evaluator. Her research experience has included evaluating the WKKellogg Foundation supported community-oriented primary care national urban demonstration project, as well as a state-supported initiative to develop and evaluate interprofessional health care delivery teams in community health centers. Recently, Dr. Cashman's work has focused on developing applied implementation initiatives that use a community-engagement model and strive to use principles of community-based participatory research. Currently, she provides evaluation research assistance to the statewide Area Health Education Center Network, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention supported Center for Excellence in Eliminating Disparities, and a Health Resources and Services Administration funded oral health case manager project that provides services to HIV positive patients. In addition, Dr. Cashman is an investigator for the school's recently funded prevention research center. A common thread in her evaluation research work is Dr. Cashman's commitment to ensuring that programs aimed at providing health care services to low-income and vulnerable populations reach their goals.

Robin Clark, PhD, Associate Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health, is a core faculty member in the Clinical and Population Health Research doctoral training program. He is also Senior Director of Research at the Center for Health Policy and Research. Robin specializes in the economic evaluation of health care interventions and policies and has authored more than 60 peer-reviewed articles in that area, primarily related to mental health and substance abuse. His work has been funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and by health and human services agencies in all of the New England states. He has also co-authored or edited four books. Robin recently completed a 4-year term as a member of the Services Research in Specialty Settings Initial Review Group for the National Institute of Mental Health. His current work focuses on efforts to manage costs and improve the quality and effectiveness of care for individuals with chronic illness, with a particular focus on Medicaid beneficiaries and other underserved populations. Robin's research includes analyses of treatment patterns and costs for severe mental illness and substance use disorders, the link between substance use disorders and quality of care for various chronic health conditions and the impact of medication assisted treatment on outcomes and costs of treatment for opioid addiction.

Christine Clements, MPH, PhD, Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health at the Center for Health Policy and Research has extensive experience in program evaluation, and is presently an Associate Director in the Evaluation and Measurement Unit at the Center. Her main areas of interest are access to health insurance and medical care for low income individuals and families and for special populations such as children with special health care needs.

Joseph DiFranza, MD, Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health, is an internationally recognized expert on teens and tobacco. Since 1980, Dr. DiFranza has been conducting research on the topic of tobacco. Winning numerous scientific and citizen activist awards for his work, Dr. DiFranza's research covers a range of tobacco-related topics including tobacco addiction, the effects of tobacco advertising, tobacco industry public relations programs, and the effects of environmental tobacco smoke. Dr. DiFranza is widely recognized for his contribution to the efforts to prevent the illegal sale of tobacco to children. He has a significant history of funding from the Massachusetts Tobacco Control Program, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the American Cancer Society, the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute of Drug Abuse. With over 80 published papers in peer-reviewed journals, plus countless other writings and presentations, Dr. DiFranza has been recognized as one of the most influential people in the fight against tobacco during the last 25 years.

Chyke Doubeni, MD, MPH, Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health and Associate Vice Provost for Diversity, ad interim, is responsible for programs for recruitment and retention of underrepresented minorities in medicine to the medical school, has research interests focusing on identifying and reducing colorectal cancer health disparities. He has conducted several studies using large data from national surveys, prospective cohort studies, clinical trials and administrative databases and is particularly interested in research on the delivery of effective colorectal cancer prevention and early detection interventions to populations. His work has also involved studies to address some of the methodological challenges of colorectal cancer screening investigations. Dr. Doubeni has received funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and is funded by the National Cancer Institute to pursue research activities with investigators in the Cancer Research Network, a consortium of geographically dispersed 14 research centers in health care delivery systems.

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