 |
|
|
Aimee Kroll-Desrosiers |
Aimee Kroll-Desrosiers, MS, a PhD candidate in Clinical and Population Health Research, and a biostatistician in the Department of Quantitative Health Sciences, was awarded the Charles E. Gibbs Leadership Prize by Women’s Health Issues, the journal of the Jacobs Institute of Women’s Health.
Kroll-Desrosiers was recognized for having the best manuscript of 2016 in Women’s Health Issues for her paper “Receipt of Prescription Opioids in a National Sample of Pregnant Veterans Receiving Veterans Health Administration Care.” She is being mentored by Kristin Michelle Mattocks, PhD, MPH, associate professor of quantitative health sciences, and an author on the paper.
“The editorial board congratulates Aimee Kroll-Desrosiers and her colleagues for conducting a methodologically strong study that addresses the important public health topic of opioid prescribing,” said Chloe Bird, the journal’s editor-in-chief.
The paper, published in the March/April 2016 edition of the journal, examined the characteristics of women veterans who filled opioid prescriptions while pregnant. The researchers identified 2,331 women who had a Veterans Health Administration-paid delivery from 2001 to 2010. They found that 10 percent of the women filled a prescription for an opioid at least once during pregnancy. They were more likely to have done so if they had a psychiatric diagnosis or were diagnosed with back problems, headaches, migraines, sprains and strains, or other nontraumatic joint disorders during their pregnancies. The authors called for “successful coordination of mental, physical and maternal medical care” for women veterans and noted that clinicians “can play a crucial role in determining the needs of patients on a case-by-case basis and to identify alternative sources of pain management when possible.”
The Charles E. Gibbs Leadership Prize is awarded annually to recognize excellence in research on women’s health care or policy. Priority is given to manuscripts that report the results of original research and that improve understanding of an important women’s health issue.
