Kayla Dunn
Kayla Dunn graduated from the University of Virginia with a BA in Global Public Health. A Pennsylvania native and a Latinx student, Dunn was the first in her family to attend college. Her experiences in life and abroad in Honduras inspired her public health research and have fueled her passion for increasing access to quality health care that is equitable, accessible, and takes the unique perspectives of culture into account. She is currently a Master’s student at the Columbia University School of Nursing.
As a SUMR Scholar, Dunn worked on two projects with Dr. Roy Wade, Jr., MD, PhD, MPH, MSHP and Dr. Zachary Meisel, MD, MPH, MSHP, respectively. With Dr. Roy Wade, she worked on a project that implemented trauma-informed practices in primary care and sought to understand mechanisms underlying transgenerational effects of early life stress on offspring health. The project also investigated screening practices for childhood adversity and tested an EHR intervention to combat these disparities. With Dr. Zachary Meisel, she assisted with the Life STORRIED project, where subjects were randomized to narrative and probabilistic-only intervention arms — perceive, share, use, and recall the communication tool and incorporate them into preferences and understanding about pain treatment. The findings of this project were to 1) provide evidence-based risk information in a format that minimized the cognitive burden of comparing and weighing attributes between treatments, and 2) encourage a conversation and shared decision-making process between the patient and provider. To complement her research interests, Kayla Dunn was a BEST Scholar at Columbia University. Additionally, she enjoys reading, singing, and spending time with friends at UVA.