KL2 Scholar Awards from the UAMS Translational Research Institute will allow (L-R) Brooke E.E. Montgomery, Ph.D., M.P.H., Anthony Goudie, Ph.D., and Tiffany Haynes, Ph.D., to dedicate the next two years to their research projects.   Aug. 16, 2012 |

Aug. 16, 2012 | Three junior researchers are the 2012 recipients of KL2 Scholar Career Development Awards totaling nearly $270,000 from the Translational Research Institute at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS).

Made each year since 2010, the KL2 Scholar Award program provides two years of financial support for protected time so that researchers can develop their research programs and receive appropriate mentoring and training. Funding support for the award comes from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the UAMS College of Medicine. The 2012 recipients are:

• Anthony Goudie, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the Department of Pediatrics in the College of Medicine
• Tiffany Haynes, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist and instructor in the Division of Health Services Research in the Department of Psychiatry in the College of Medicine
• Brooke E.E. Montgomery, Ph.D., M.P.H., assistant professor in the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education in the Fay W. Boozman College of Public Health

The three were selected from eight applicants.

“Dr. Goudie, Dr. Haynes and Dr. Montgomery represent the best and brightest at UAMS, so we’re excited about their research to come,” said Curtis Lowery, M.D., the principal investigator and director of the Translational Research Institute. “The goal of the KL2 Award program is to increase the number and quality of translational research investigators, and this latest group gives UAMS eleven researchers who have received a KL2 since 2010.”

Goudie’s KL2 Scholar Award will allow him to focus on identifying barriers to the use of prevention procedures that reduce Clostridium difficile (a type of bacteria) infections acquired in pediatric health care settings.

Goudie notes that hospitals have seen an increase in incidence and variation of Clostridium difficile infection rates despite knowledge of practices known to prevent or reduce their contraction, such as hand hygiene, contact precautions, environmental cleaning, lab alerts, and staff and patient education.  Ultimately, the results of his research will inform policy-makers on effective incentive settings for low-performing hospitals.

Goudie earned his undergraduate degrees in statistics and economics from Memorial University of Newfoundland in Canada. He completed a Master of Science in Public Health and a doctorate in health services research, both from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Prior to joining the faculty of UAMS in September 2011, Goudie was faculty with the Child Policy Research Center at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital.

Haynes will use her KL2 award to examine the relationship between religious beliefs and attitudes about mental health service with the goal of developing an intervention for rural African-Americans that is delivered through churches. Ultimately, she plans to design a large-scale study to test the effectiveness of a multifaceted intervention that provides education, stigma reduction and connections to appropriate services.

Haynes recently joined UAMS as a clinical psychologist and instructor in the Department of Psychiatry in the College of Medicine. As an African-American from a rural impoverished town in the Arkansas Delta, Haynes observed firsthand the negative effects of untreated mental illness in her community. This experience led her to a career dedicated to reducing disparities in mental health service use among rural African-Americans.

Haynes earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology from Xavier University in New Orleans, La., and completed a master’s degree and doctorate in psychology from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Earlier this year she completed a postdoctoral fellowship in advanced psychology at the Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System in Little Rock.

Montgomery’s KL2 project will expand on the current literature by examining epidemiologic relationships between violence and sexual risk in a large national dataset of at-risk women. She will conduct interviews with community stakeholders in the field of sexual violence to identify potential facilitators and barriers to the creation and implementation of a sexual risk reduction intervention for women who have experienced sexual violence. She also will adapt and test an evidence-based HIV prevention intervention for this underserved and vulnerable population.

Montgomery earned a bachelor’s degree in biology and women’s studies from Washington University in St. Louis, and completed a Master of Public Health and doctorate in health promotion and prevention research, both from UAMS. She became a UAMS faculty member in 2010.

The KL2 awards provide didactic and mentored research training for postdoctorates or professional doctorates (M.D., Pharm.D., Dr.PH., D.O., etc.) who are committed to academic careers in clinical or translational research. The Translational Research Institute grants up to four awardees per year, with up to eight scholar positions funded at any given time.

The UAMS Translational Research Institute is funded by the NIH’s National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA). The institute is one of 60 CTSA recipients nationally.