The candidate, Ms. Jennifer Rohan, is a second-year graduate student in the Clinical Health Psychology doctoral program with an emphasis in Pediatric Psychology at the University of Cincinnati. She is working under the mentorship of Dr. Dennis Drotar, Professor and Director of the Center for Treatment Adherence at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. [The sponsor and co-sponsor mentorship team was chosen based on their content expertise in key areas related to the application as well as Ms. Rohans collaboration with Drs. Vinks1and Rausch on various research projects. Drs. Perentesis (Oncologist/Director of Hematology-Oncology at CCHMC) and Huang (Biostatistician) were chosen as consultants/mentors for Ms. Rohan to gain specialized training in pediatric cancer and ALL as well as advanced data analytic methods respectively]. The proposed training plan includes opportunities for training in pediatric cancer, research ethics, advanced statistical techniques, pharmacological and research methods related to treatment adherence, and [comprehensive clinical management of pediatric adherence in a range of chronic conditions]. The proposed training proposal will facilitate dissertation analyses that will examine [predictors of] treatment adherence, [including] treatment status, and psychosocial factors. These opportunities will facilitate Ms. Rohan's professional development as a [pediatric psychology] researcher, and facilitate her career potential [to conduct research in pediatric cancer as well as other chronic illness populations]. Ms. Rohan's long-term career goal is to obtain a research-focused tenure-track faculty position in a pediatric medical center and/or university academic setting and conduct research investigating treatment adherence and self-management in the context of pediatric chronic illness, specifically pediatric cancer. [It should be noted that the proposed measurement plan and data analytic strategy being used in the current study has broad applicability and generalizability to other chronic conditions. As1evidenced1by1Ms1Rohans1training1to1date?1she1 is interested in a broad range of chronic conditions and plans to work with a number of disease populations in her career]. The proposed NRSA predoctoral fellowship (F31) will investigate treatment adherence to a daily chemotherapy medication in a sample of children and adolescents (N = 138) ages 7-18 years diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. The proposed project is a secondary data analysis using data collected from an ongoing parent study currently funded by the National Cancer Institute (PI: Drotar;R01 CA119162). It should be noted that the proposed research presented in this NRSA was not a part of the primary or secondary aims of the larger parent study. The proposed study involves a new data analytic strategy that would not have otherwise been conducted if not1for1Ms1Rohans 1interest1in1combining two objective methods of treatment adherence (behavioral/pharmacological) to predict a clinical outcome (absolute neutrophil count: ANC). The parent study sample is ideal for the proposed data analytic strategies that require samples of 100 or more participants and would not otherwise be available using one site.
The proposed NRSA predoctoral fellowship (F31) will provide Ms. Rohan with the opportunity to investigate two objective measures of medication adherence in pediatric cancer to determine the role adherence has on a clinical biomarker (absolute neutrophil count). This will advance research and clinical practice for determining how adherence to a prescribed daily medication affects clinical biomarkers. The fellowship training plan will also provide Ms. Rohan with ample opportunities to enhance her skills development [in conducting research with chronic illness populations, conducting advanced statistical and data analytic methods, and preparation] and training for a research career in pediatric chronic illness, treatment adherence, [and randomized controlled trials]. [The proposed research plan is different from the currently funded parent R01 in that it proposes a data analytic strategy and method that would not have otherwise been conducted as part of the parent proposal. This research plan was independently proposed by Ms. Rohan based on its potential broad applicability to the measurement of treatment adherence in other chronic illness populations.]
| Rohan, Jennifer M; Drotar, Dennis; Alderfer, Melissa et al. (2015) Electronic monitoring of medication adherence in early maintenance phase treatment for pediatric leukemia and lymphoma: identifying patterns of nonadherence. J Pediatr Psychol 40:75-84 |
| Rohan, Jennifer M; Huang, Bin; Pendley, Jennifer Shroff et al. (2015) Predicting Health Resilience in Pediatric Type 1 Diabetes: A Test of the Resilience Model Framework. J Pediatr Psychol 40:956-67 |
