Red Hot Research 1

She is an appointed member of the US Department of Veterans Affairs’ Geriatric and Gerontology Advisory Committee and the NIH’s Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee. Dr. Baker is also the Editor-in-Chief of Ethnicity & Health (Taylor & Francis Group). She is a Fellow of the Gerontological Society of America (GSA), and founder member and co-convener of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Collaborative Interest Group. Her background in Gerontology, Psychology, and Biobehavioral Health has evolved into an active research agenda that focuses on understanding the behavioral and psychosocial predictors and outcomes of chronic pain and symptom management among older adults from historically marginalized populations. Specifically, she examines health disparities and inequities in access and availability to pain management resources among older Black adults.

Dr. Okereke is a board-certified geriatric psychiatrist, Director of Geriatric Psychiatry and Director of the MGH Psychiatry Center for Racial Equity and Justice in the Department of Psychiatry at MGH, Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and Associate Professor in Epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She PD/PI of the Alzheimer's RCMAR, Mass-ENVISION, and MPI of the Alzheimer's Roybal Center, CONFIDED-ADRD. Her research is focused on identifying modifiable risk factors in adverse mental aging, prevention, and community-engaged research for promoting equity and reduction of health disparities. She has led numerous projects with the support of NIH and other funding sources and has been extensively involved in organizational leadership, community volunteering, and education in ADRD over the past two decades. Dr. Okereke has mentored over 40 faculty members, fellows, residents, interns, and students and provides teaching and mentoring to scholars in psychiatry and/or geriatric mental health (2 T32 and 3 R25 programs).

I graduated from Seoul National University for my Master’s degree in Nursing in South Korea, with specialty of geriatric primary care nurse certificate. I earned my Ph.D. degree in Nursing at the University of Iowa and I am an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Arlington College of Nursing and Health Innovation. I had research and educational experience in gerontological nursing at long term service and support settings (LTSS), focusing on the population living with dementia and their caregivers. My research interest focuses on leveraging technology-based interventions such as video chat, wearable devices, virtual reality, and home monitoring to enhance the quality of life for family and formal caregivers and persons living with dementia. My research projects focus on dyadic communication intervention studies: a video family visit intervention for residents living with dementia and their family caregivers at nursing homes, and a virtual reality simulation training for direct nursing workers and senior volunteers who work with persons living with dementia, using AI generated patients (Virtual Reality Communication Training Optimizing Real-world Interactions [VICTORI]). I will further apply these studies to Hispanic and Korean American populations in rural area of Texas.

Tony V Pham, MD, MScGH is a psychiatrist and NIH funded researcher at the Center for Health Outcomes and Interdisciplinary Research (CHOIR) at Massachusetts General Hospital. Tony completed his undergraduate training at the University of Virginia where he majored in psychology and cognitive science. He volunteered extensively with Hurricane Katrina survivors and went on to pursue an MD at Tulane University. After medical school, Tony completed a psychiatry residency and a Master's in Global Health at Duke University. More recently, Tony completed a Harvard post-doctoral fellowship that examined the role of "culture as treatment" among American Indian communities. Tony has published on the subjects of resident well-being, disaster mental health, spirituality among individuals with chronic kidney disease patients from rural Robeson County, North Carolina, the intersection between Nepali traditional healers and conventional psychotherapy, chronic pain, and health disparities. He is currently adapting mind-body interventions for the chronic health needs of older Black Americans living in the Greater Boston Area. His professional goal is to become an independent clinician-scientist who develops community-driven, culturally-tailored, meaning-focused interventions, provides clinical care, and mentors other clinical investigators.