Enhancing emergency and acute care research throughout Northern New England.

This COBRE in Acute Care Research & Rural Health program is led by Dr. Doug Sawyer, Program Director, with support from Dr. David Seder and Dr. Tom Gridley, members of the Administrative Core of this COBRE. This program is supported by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, National Institutes of Health, Award Number P20GM139745.

The overall program has four major goals:

1. Provide the leadership, governance, and advisory network to establish a COBRE in Acute Care Research and Rural Health at Maine Medical Center.

2. Provide project and mentorship support to launch the careers of promising clinician-scientists within this scientific program, and help ensure their long-term scientific success as independent researchers.

3. Enhance the capabilities of Maine Medical Center’s research infrastructure and core facilities to support human subject research of both our COBRE investigators and other institutional and external researchers, and to stimulate innovative research methodologies and new collaborations.

4. Enhance our existing Metabolic COBRE and NNE-CTR supported pilot project programs to focus on translational and clinical opportunities related to acute care and rural health disparities.

Acute Care Research Up Close

This video describes a collaborative project with the Neurocritical Care Department to determine if high Neuregulin levels correlate with improved survival after cardiac arrest.

COBRE Projects

This COBRE program has four clinical/translational project leaders with clinical research areas in primary acute care needs. These Project Leaders have complementary research expertise, and have already established collaborations with each other. Projects details are described below.

Teresa May, DO, MS: Dr. May’s project is examining how MaineHealth can improve rural patient outcomes after cardiac arrest by creating a standard best practice protocol for care.

David Gagnon, PharmD: Dr. Gagnon’s project is studying how giving patients the antibiotic ceftriaxone after cardiac arrest may help improve outcomes after resuscitation.

Kristen Woodberry, PhD, MSW: Dr. Woodberry’s project is testing whether screening adolescents and young adults for psychosis in the rural primary care setting can enhance early detection and initial care of psychosis, ultimately improving outcomes for young people experiencing psychotic symptoms.

Allison Zanno, MD: Dr. Zanno’s project is studying ways to improve health outcomes of infants born in rural hospitals by optimizing a telesimulation training program for neonatal resuscitation.

COBRE Core

Programs

This program supports two core initiatives that strengthen MHIR’s facilities and research infrastructure for human subject studies by COBRE investigators and other researchers. It fosters innovative methodologies, new collaborations, and community engagement to address participation challenges among rural populations.

Community Engagement, Bioethics, & Outreach 

Frank Chessa, PhD and Richard Riker, MD, are leading the Community Engagement, Bioethics, & Outreach Core with assistance from Neil Korsen MD, MSc. This group oversees community engagement in clinical research, research training for clinicians across MaineHealth, and provides assistance with IRB submissions for research and pilot project leaders.

This COBRE Core group provides project and mentorship support to launch the careers of promising clinician-scientists within this scientific program, and help ensure their long-term scientific success as independent researchers.

The mentorship network and services provided by our Community Engagement, Bioethics, and Outreach Core facility enhances future human subjects research, increases the understanding of individual preferences from diverse backgrounds for acute care research via community engagement, and synergizes with existing NIH-funded programs at Maine Medical Center.

Pilot Project Program 

The Pilot Project Program is managed by the Administrative Core of the Acute Care COBRE. It is designed to stimulate new collaborations and multidisciplinary partnerships, demonstrate the feasibility of new clinical and translational research projects, and enable the collection of preliminary data for future applications for peer-reviewed extramural funding. Two projects of up to $50,000 in direct costs each are funded yearly by the COBRE.

Year 1

  • Kristen Woodberry PhD, MSW: Leveraging Lived Experience to Improve Outcomes for Rural Youth with Psychotic-Spectrum Experiences
  • Yvonne Jonk, PhD: The Need for Health Services and Supports among Victims of Elder Abuse
 Year 3

  • Michael Zubrow, MD: Cardiac Arrest Rural Disparity Improvement using Novel Applications of Long-distance Simulation (CARDINALS)
  • Anne Hicks, MD: Using Intraoperative Variables to Predict Outcomes in Cardiac Surgical Patients
Year 2

  • Allison Zanno, MD: MOOSE: Telesimulation for Neonatal Resuscitation Training in Rural Community Hospitals (MOOSE = Maine Ongoing Outreach Simulation Education)
  • Michael Burla, MD: Improving the Approach to Cardiac Arrest Patients in the Interfacility Transfer Setting
 Year 4

  • Madeleine Puissant MD, PhD: Beta-1 Adrenergic Inhibition to Reduce Cardiac Injury and Inflammation After Subarachnoid Hemorrhage
  • Aurora Quaye, MD: Improving Opioid Use Disorder Management in the Rural Acute Care Setting

The External and Internal Advisory Committees are created to give the COBRE leadership and project leaders support and strategic direction. The external advisory committee provides scientific direction and guidance, consisting of national experts in the field.

The internal advisory committee is comprised of research professionals with significant leadership experience from MaineHealth/Maine Medical Center, who provide strategic links to existing programs.

External Advisory

Committee

Alexandra Adams, MD, PhD
Director of the Center for American Indian and Rural Health Excellence (CAIRHE), Montana State University

Clifton Callaway, MD, PhD
Executive Vice Chair of Emergency Medicine, University of Pittsburgh

Anne Mosenthal, MD
Chief Academic Officer, Lahey Hospital and Medical Center

Internal Advisory

Committee

Michael Baumann, MD
Chair, Emergency Medical Services at MaineHealth

Daniel Diekema, MD
Vice Chair for Research; Director, Division of Infectious Diseases Department of Medicine, Maine Medical Center

Lucy Liaw, PhD
Director of Research Training Programs and PI of the COBRE in Metabolic Networks

Mary Ottolini, MD
Chair, Department of Pediatrics at MaineHealth

Clifford Rosen, MD
Director of the Center for Clinical and Translational Research and PI of the NNE-CTR

This program is supported by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, National Institutes of Health, Award Number P20GM139745. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH.