Dr. Breland-Noble Appointed to PCORI Health Disparities Panel
Posted in GUMC Stories
Alfiee M. Breland-Noble, PhD, MHSc, assistant professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University Medical Center, has been selected to join the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI)’s Advisory Panel on Addressing Disparities. The newly established panel announced April 1 is one of four such panels approved by the PCORI board of governors to help guide the work at the institute.
“It is a genuine honor to be recognized by my peers as someone worthy of representing biomedical and clinical researchers invested in disparities research,” says Breland-Noble, a community-engaged researcher who has focused on family mental health disparities in diverse communities for more than 15 years. “I am truly elated to participate on this panel, focused on not just examining disparities, but truly formulating plans to address disparities.”
PCORI is an independent, non-profit organization authorized by the U.S. Congress in 2010. Its mission is to fund research that will provide patients, their caregivers and clinicians with the evidence-based information needed to make better-informed health care decisions.
“PCORI has demonstrated an admirable commitment to supporting patients and consumers and to bringing them together with researchers to affect change in ways that are relevant and congruent with consumers’ needs,” she says.
PCORI says the panels will be instrumental in helping refine and prioritize research questions, provide needed scientific and technical expertise, offer input on other issues relevant to its mission and help model full and meaningful patient and stakeholder engagement efforts.
“Our advisory panels are representative of our diverse stakeholder community — contributing valuable experience and expertise to our efforts to build a portfolio of patient-centered comparative effectiveness research,” said Anne Beal, MD, MPH, PCORI’s Deputy Executive Director, Chief Officer for Engagement and Chief Operating Officer. “We look forward to working with them as we fund research that will help patients and those who care for them make better-informed health care decisions.”
Breland-Noble says she’s pleased to have the opportunity to meet the advisory panel mandate of identifying research priorities, supporting new research topics and establishing the disparities research agenda — and that she’ll advocate on behalf of families who seek health and emotional/behavioral well-being for youth.
“I am committed to honoring the strengths and addressing the challenges in racially and ethnically diverse communities as we work toward reducing mental and behavioral health disparities,” she says.
By Karen Mallet, GUMC Communications