Implementation of a Clinician-led Medication Adherence Intervention Among Patients With Systemic Lupus Erythematosus.

My clinical interests are in general rheumatology, lupus, and musculoskeletal ultrasound. My research interest is in healthcare disparities and medication adherence in rheumatology.

Dr. Amy Corneli, a social scientist by training, conducts qualitative, mixed-method, intervention, and implementation science research. Her work spans the U.S. and multiple countries in sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and South and Southeast Asia. She has a history of collaborating with and learning from community organizations and representatives in conducting research with populations that face discrimination, bias, or unequal treatment within the healthcare system and society due to race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, or socioeconomic status. Her collaborative research often focuses on generating synergies between the creativity of art and the analytical thinking of science. The findings from her research inform clinical trials and practice, socio-behavioral interventions, guideline development, and the practical dissemination of proven interventions.

Dr. Corneli's current research portfolio encompasses three areas:

1. Leading, co-leading, mentoring, and supporting qualitative, mixed-methods, and implementation science research in HIV prevention.
2. Serving as a methodological investigative partner on qualitative, mixed-methods, and intervention research on a variety of health conditions and topics with faculty in the School of Medicine at Duke University.
3. Leading the social science team for the Clinical Trials Transformation Initiative, a public-private initiative between Duke University and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Dr. Corneli is also the:

1. Founder and Director of QualCore, a group of PhD- and master-level social scientists who partner with Duke faculty to provide scientific direction and interviewing and analysis expertise in qualitative research.
2. Co-founder and Director of The BASE (Bioethics and Stakeholder Engagement) Lab, a group of faculty and staff that partner with clinical investigators at Duke to conduct research with key contributors to inform the planning, conduct, interpretation, and reporting of clinical research.
3. Director of the Duke CFAR Social and Behavioral Sciences Core.

QualCore | https://populationhealth.duke.edu/research/qualcore

The BASE Lab | https://populationhealth.duke.edu/research/base-lab

Duke CFAR Social and Behavioral Sciences Core | https://cfar.duke.edu 

Clinical Trials Transformation Initiative | https://www.ctti-clinicaltrials.org 

Prior to joining Duke University, Dr. Corneli was engaged in biomedical HIV prevention research at FHI 360 for 10 years.

Dr. Pollak is a social psychologist who designs and tests behavioral interventions to promote smoking cessation, reduce health disparities, and improve clinician-patient communication. She also is one of the Multiple Principal Investigators of the Palliative Care Research Cooperative that supports multi-site palliative care trials. Finally, Dr. Pollak serves as a Communication Coach where she teaches clinicians effective communication techniques.

Area of expertise: Health Behavior

I am an adult and pediatric rheumatologist with clinical and research interests in the areas of lupus and transition to adult care.  My time is split between the departments of Medicine and Pediatrics.  In addition to seeing patients in both environments, I run a dedicated Young Adult Rheumatology Clinic in collaboration with Duke Family Medicine.

My clinical interests include systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and inflammatory myopathies.  I also  maintain a general rheumatology continuity clinic for individuals with rheumatoid arthritis, vasculitis, and other forms of inflammatory arthritis and autoimmune diseases.  In 2007, I co-founded the Duke Lupus Clinic with Dr. Megan Clowse.  We have continued this clinic with the aim to improve the health and quality of life for individuals living with lupus. 

My primary research interests are in education and in SLE.  My particular interest within education is learner assessment.  I was previously funded by a Clinician Scholar Educator Award through the Rheumatology Research Foundation of the American College of Rheumatology.  My CSE project explored validation of a rheumatology objective structured clinical examination (ROSCE). I continue to collaborate with the Rheumatology Program Directors at UNC Chapel Hill, Wake Forest University, the Medical University of South Carolina and Massachusetts General Hospital through our Carolinas Fellows Collaborative. Members of this group composed the competency-based goals and objectives (CBGO) for all learning activities of rheumatology fellowship training programs, which were adopted by the American College of Rheumatology and are posted on their website. I have been very involved in rheumatology curricular efforts through the American College of Rheumatology. I served on the Milestones working group and am a past member and past Chair of the ACR Curriculum Subcommittee of the Committee on Training and Workforce. I previously participated on the ACR/NBME rheumatology in-training examination working group.               

Clinical research in lupus has included the Duke Lupus Registry population.  Our recent work focuses on creating and defining the type 1 and type 2 lupus paradigms for classifying lupus disease activity.  Additional interests through the Duke Lupus Clinic include elucidating clinician-level factors that can influence medication adherence as well as determining how health literacy and numeracy impact adherence and patient level outcomes.  I collaborate with Dr. Megan Clowse, who studies reproductive health in women with autoimmune diseases.  We have combined her subject matter expertise with my educational skills to create HOP-STEP, a program to teach patients with lupus and their rheumatologists about pregnancy planning to improve health outcomes.  We have created lupuspregnancy.org, which houses many resources and videos designed to teach rheumatologists to better partner with women with lupus to have open and honest discussions about pregnancy planning.  Our ultimate aim is to improve the health outcomes for women with lupus and their offspring.