Cara Frankenfeld, PhD

Faculty Scientist III

Research Interests

  • The multi-directional association between diet and environmental exposures with the gut microbiome, and health impacts associated with these relationships.
  • The interaction between personal characteristics and health care structures with spatially distributed inequalities.

Dr. Cara Frankenfeld joined MaineHealth Insitute for Research in August 2023.  Dr. Frankenfeld holds a doctorate in Epidemiology and a master’s degree in Nutritional Science. She is an experienced epidemiologist and biostatistician with twenty years of work in the design and conduct of observational and clinical human health research studies, evidence synthesis, and scientific communication to diverse audiences. Her expertise is in research design and analysis of complex data, such as microbiome, metabolome, diet, and spatial factors. She has applied this expertise primarily to chronic health conditions, including cancer and cardiometabolic diseases. She has also provided biostatistical expertise to investigators working in geography and healthcare administration. Her work has been funded by the federal, academic, and private sources, and she is a Fellow of the American College of Epidemiology, an Associate Editor for Annals of Epidemiology, and on the Editorial Board for the Journal of Nutrition.

Cleaveland CL, Frankenfeld CL. Economic factors are strongly associated with poorer Latino Mental Health during COVID-19. J Race Ethnic Disparities 2023;10:1823-36. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40615-022-13266-8

Hughes RL, Frankenfeld CL, Gohl DM, Huttenhower C, Jackson SA, Vandeputte D, Vogtmann E, Comstock SS, Kable ME. Methods in Nutrition & Gut Microbiome Research: An American Society of Nutrition Satellite Session. Nutrients 2023;15(11):2451. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu15112451

Frankenfeld CL. Population-specific diet quality scores in nutritional epidemiology. J Nutr 2023;153(3):608-609. https://10.1016/j.tjnut.2023.01.004

Frankenfeld CL, Maskarinec G, Franke AA. Metabolomics profiles of premenopausal women are different based on O-desmethylangolensin metabotype. Brit J Nutr 2022;128:1490-1498. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007114521004463

Leslie TF, Frankenfeld CL, Menon N. Racial and economic residential segregation of diagnostic hospital: disparities in colorectal cancer time-to-treatment and survival in Georgia, United States. Cancer Epidemiol 2022;81:102267. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.canep.2022.102267

Leslie TF, Frankenfeld CL, Hattery A. Differentiating Black and Hispanic: Outcome differences of segregated communities and police shootings 2011-2014. Injury Epidemiol 2022;9(1):8. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40621-022-00372-y

Frankenfeld CL. Probing beyond: looking into the patterns within a high-quality diet. J Nutr 2022;152:653-654. https://doi.org/10.1093/jn/nxab438

Frankenfeld CL, Lampe JW, Hullar MA, Maskarinec G, Lim U, Monroe KR, Shepherd JA, Randolph TW, Wilkens LR, Boushey CJ, Le Marchand L. Components and biomarkers of diet quality associated with the gut microbiome in the Multiethnic Cohort Study. J Acad Nutr Diet 2022;122:78-98. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jand.2021.05.023

Frankenfeld CL, Hakes JK, Leslie TF. All-cause mortality and residential racial and ethnic segregation and composition as experienced differently by individual-level race, ethnicity, and gender: Mortality Disparities in American Communities data. Ann Epidemiol 2021;65:38-45. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annepidem.2021.10.008

Frankenfeld CL. Reduced rank regression: illustration of an important tool in the evaluation of dietary patterns and chronic disease risk. J Nutr 2021, published online October 13, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1093/jn/nxab331

Frankenfeld CL, Leslie TF, Menon NM. Longer time-to-treatment but better survival for colorectal cancer patients presumptively not diagnosed in a hospital. Cancer Causes Control 2021;32:1185-1191. https://doi.org/10.1007/s105552-021-01464-8

Slavin M, Li H, Khatri M, Frankenfeld C. Dietary magnesium and migraine in adults: A cross-sectional analysis of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 2001-2004. Headache 2021;61:276-286. https://doi.org/10.1111/head.14065

Menon N, Leslie TF, Frankenfeld CL. Cancer capabilities of hospitals in the context of racial residential segregation. Public Health 2020;182:95-101. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.puhe.2020.02.004

Frankenfeld CL, Menon N, Leslie TF. Time-to-treatment and survival-time for colorectal tumors and diagnosing hospital cancer-related diagnostic and treatment capabilities in Georgia. Cancer Epidemiol 2020;65:101684. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.canep.2020.101684

Cuellar AE, Adams LM, de Jonge E, Espina V, Espinoza L, Frankenfeld CL, Hines D, Kornienko O, Lawrence H, Rana ZH, Ramazani N, Short J, Waithaka EN, Wilson AN, Cheskin LJ. The Mason: Health Starts Here Prospective Cohort Study. BMC Public Health 2021. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-10969

Slavin M, Huilin L, Frankenfeld CL, Cheskin LJ. What is needed for evidence-based dietary recommendations for migraine: a call to action for nutrition and microbiome research. Headache J Head Face Pain 2019;10:1566-1581, https://doi.org/10.1111/head.13658

Frankenfeld CL, Leslie TF. Descriptive epidemiology of homicides in which victim and suspect are concordant or discordant on race or Hispanic ethnicity in the United States: Analysis of National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) 2005-2015. J Interpersonal Violence 2019, published on-line July 9, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1177/0886260519861656

Frankenfeld CL, Leslie TF. County-level socioeconomic factors and residential racial, Hispanic, poverty, and unemployment segregation associated with drug overdose deaths in the United States, 2010-2015. Annals of Epidemiol, 2019;35:12-19. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annepidem.2019.04.009

Cleaveland C, Frankenfeld CL. “They kill people over nothing:” An exploratory study of Latina immigrant trauma. J Social Services Res 2020;46:507-523, https://doi.org/10.1080/01488376.2019.1602100

Miller LM, Lampe JW, Newton KM, Gundersen G, Fuller S, Reed SD, Frankenfeld CL. Being overweight or obese is associated with harboring a gut microbial community not capable of metabolizing the soy isoflavone daidzein to O-desmethylangolensin in soy-consuming peri- and post-menopausal women. Maturitas, 2017;99:37-42. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.maturitas.2017.02.006

Frankenfeld CL. Cardiometabolic risk and gut microbial phytoestrogen metabolite phenotypes. Mol Nutr Food Res 2017;Jul 28. https://doi.org/10.1002/mnfr.20159000