Internal Medicine Funding Awards: Two Female Faculty Honored
The Department of Internal Medicine awarded the Junior Clinical Track Award and the Research/Tenure-Line Award to two female faculty.
These funding opportunities seek to support women to maintain scholarly productivity during the unique time in their careers where there is an overlap of early career challenges with child rearing and caregiving. While women have made up nearly 50% of medical school classes for decades, there remains a significant gap in the advancement of women faculty to Professor level and under-representation of women in tenure track faculty. These awards are designed to promote academic career development and provide support for scholarly work while considering the unique challenges that women face practicing Academic Internal Medicine.
Our recipients this year were:
Dr. Kira Watson, MD,MPH
Dr. Kira Watson, MD,MPH (DGIM) for the Clinical Track, to support a project called “Depression Screening in Primary Care”. She will be collaborating with the Mental Health Integration group to study the impact of standardized depression screening, examine factors related to screening rates, and identify the severity of depression and access to care for follow-up screening in primary internal medicine clinics.
Dr. Watson is a primary care provider at Sugarhouse Clinic. She is trained in both internal medicine and pediatrics, and now practices as a general internist and pediatrician.
Erin Bouldin, PhD, MPH
Dr. Erin Bouldin, PhD, MPH (Division of Epidemiology) for the Research/Tenure-Line, whose project is entitled, “Family Caregiver Experiences of Strain and Home- and Community-Based Service Use.” This project supports her current work of understanding and leveraging support from family and other community members to improve the health and quality of life of people living with various health conditions, particularly those with cognitive impairment. Data will be used to support an R01 application to the National Institute on Aging.
Dr. Bouldin is trained as an epidemiologist and health services researcher. In her research, she aims to identify factors that influence disability and function, intervene to reduce impairments, improve health and participation in an equitable way, and support family and professional caregivers. Her work focuses on the experiences and service needs of people living with disabilities, injuries, and cognitive impairment including Alzheimer's disease and related dementias and their caregivers. Dr. Bouldin is particularly interested in home- and community-based services and the experiences of Veterans and people living in rural areas. In addition to her role in the Department of Internal Medicine, she is an Investigator in the Health Services Research & Development (HSR&D) Informatics, Decision-Enhancement and Analytic Sciences (IDEAS) Center at the VA Health Care System in Salt Lake City.
