MIRECC / CoE

Highlights from Our Anchor Sites

Our affiliates in Houston, Little Rock, New Orleans, and VISN 17 work hard to promote mental health education, research, and treatment locally and nationally. Here are some highlights of their accomplishments over the past three months.

Houston

Dr. Jan Lindsay Talked with BCM Blog

Dr. Lindsay discussed how she maintains a healthy lifestyle in her daily life in the Baylor College of Medicine Blog. Her strategies for maintaining her physical and mental health during the pandemic include VA-developed apps, like COVID Coach, fitness apps and trackers, and finding joy where she can.

 

Little Rock

Affiliates Present at #DIScience20

Drs. Sara Landes, Eva Woodward, Sonia Singh, and their colleagues presented at the AcademyHealth 13th Annual Conference on the Science and Dissemination and Implementation in Health (#DIScience20) virtual conference. Presentations included:

• Dr. Singh’s first author poster on qualitative findings of adjusting a national implementation effort in the VA during COVID in patient-level intervention.
• Dr. Woodward’s first author poster with the Implementation Science for Health Equity Lab on a practice guide to incorporating health equity domains in implementation frameworks.
• Dr. Landes participated in a “Meet the Experts” informal networking session where she discussed the implementation science field and highlighted postdoctoral research programs in Little Rock, including our own.

 

New Orleans

Dr. Gala True Begins Work on New Grants on Suicide Risk Reduction and Rural Veteran Engagement and Housing

Dr. True has new grants starting up with relevance to the MIRECC mission. HSR&D-funded “Can Services to Address Veterans Social Determinants of Health Reduce Their Suicide Risk?” (CoPIs: Ann Elizabeth Montgomery and Gala True) explores whether using services tailored to selected social determinants of health (SDH) reduces suicide mortality for Veterans, and to identify opportunities to integrate suicide prevention practices into SDH-focused programs.

“Growing Rural Outreach through Veteran Engagement (GROVE) Center” (PI: Leah Wendleton) is funded through the VA Office of Rural Health (ORH) and will develop processes, tools, and guidelines to facilitate engagement of rural Veterans in research. Also funded by ORH is “Identifying and Disseminating Strategies for Improving Access to Health Care Among Unstably Housed Veterans in Rural Areas” (PI: Ann Elizabeth Montgomery). This study will identify barriers and facilitators to improving access to health care for unstably housed Veterans living in rural areas.

 

Last updated: January 22, 2021