Dr. Karen Woo Receives Two NIH Awards

Karen Woo, MD, PhD has received two NIH awards. Dr. Woo is a vascular surgeon and Professor of Surgery at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.

From the UCLA Department of Surgery on September 27, 2022:

Dr. Karen Woo has received another R01 Award from the NIH. After receiving her first R01 earlier this year, Dr. Karen Woo of Vascular Surgery has received the grant award for her new project: Comparing Surgical and Endovascular Arteriovenous Fistula Creation.

Congratulations again, Drs. Woo and Gelabert we are very proud of you and celebrate this tremendous year that you and your collaborators have been having in your pursuit of scholarship. 

From the UCLA Department of Surgery on August 31, 2022:

Dr. Karen Woo of Vascular Surgery has received R01 Funding from the NIH for her project, Improving the Patient Experience of Hemodialysis Vascular Access Decision Making.

The overall goal of Dr. Woo's project is to create an evidence base of factors significantly associated with vascular access outcomes and optimize patient engagement in and satisfaction with the hemodialysis vascular access decision-making experience.

 

Specifically, they plan to:

1. Advance understanding of previously little studied factors associated with adverse vascular access outcomes

2. Co-create with patients and clinicians a novel prognostic tool accompanied by educational materials

3. Provide comprehensive understandings of physician-patient interactions during vascular access decision-making, ways to improve the patient experience, and how best to integrate the novel tools into decision-making

4. Lead to improved delivery of personalized, evidence-based vascular access care

   Dr. Woo's collaborators on this project are Jesus Ulloa, MD, MBA, MS (Vascular Surgery), Alex Bui, PhD (Medical Imaging and Informatics), Keith Norris, MD, PhD (General Internal Medicine), Steven Clayman, PhD (Sociology - This is a very unique partnership and we are capitalizing on expertise that is uniquely available here at UCLA and not at very many other institutions), Li-Jung Liang (Department of Medicine Statistics Core), Marissa Seamans, PhD, MSPH (FSPH Epidemiology), Michelle Keller, PhD, MPH (FSPH Health Policy and Management) and will begin this fall.

    “I chose Health Services Research (HSR) for a number of reasons. My primary objective with performing research is to do work that can improve the patient experience of health care. I love the idea of potentially being able to improve the care of manyfold more patients as a researcher than I can touch individually with my hands as a surgeon."

   Congratulations to Dr. Woo on receiving her first R01 award and her team of collaborators on this outstanding achievement.