Collaborators

Research Collaborators

I started as a Research Assistant working for Dr. Robert Carter on racial and ethnic identity and who is now doing groundbreaking work on racial trauma at Columbia University. Early collaboration with Dr. Steven R. López at the University of Southern California influenced my thinking on how to think about culture and adaptation. In designing and testing the Culturally Adapted Motivational Interview (CAMI), I have worked over the years with Dr. Dharma Cortés at Cambridge Health Alliance, Dr. Raul Caetano at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Dr. Luis Falcón at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell. The Brown Research Group, comprised of Dr. Suzanne Colby, Dr. Damaris Rohsenow, and Dr. Rosemarie Martin, has also been the main collaborators in this work. More currently, in this implementation research study, I am collaborating with implementation scientist Dr. Mari-Lynn Drainoni and mental health expert Dr. Kim Mueser. We are doing a cost analysis of the CAMI, led by Jake Morgan PhD at the BU School of Public Health, and other co-Investigators, including Dr. Christine Pace, Executive Medical Director of the Boston Affordable Care Organization.

Role as a Mentor

My mentees include Dr. Victor Figuereo, now Assistant Professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Social Work, and Dr. Lynn Hernandez, Vice-Chancellor for Diversity and Inclusion at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, Dr. Audrey Hang Hai, PhD, now Assistant Professor at Tulane University School of Social Work, and Dr. Alice Cheng, PhD,  Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, Bridgewater State University. The brilliant Teena Hallett (MSW expected 2024) was an Addiction Research Fellow at the BU School of Social Work in the HEAL Lab and is now Project Manager of AHOPE Needle Exchange, Boston Public Health Commission.

I  mentor several individuals on their NIH K-awards, including Dr. Robert Rosales, PhD,  Assistant Professor, Research Scholar Track in the Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences at Brown University, Dr. Angela Haeny, Director of the Racial Equity and Addiction Lab at Yale University, and Dr. David Zelaya, PhD,  an Assistant Professor (Research) at Brown University School of Public Health (SPH) within the Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies (CAAS), Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences and a research fellow at Harvard Medical School within the Department of Psychiatry.

Community Engagement and Volunteer Research

I have been most fortunate to work with experts in the community, including Liliana Torres, PhD, now Clinical Manager at Boston Medical Center and Zulma Montana,  Director at Lawrence Prospera. I am proud of my volunteer and service work in the community, which includes helping to establish a successful Integrated Behavioral Health Program at South End Community Health Center, which is now affiliated with East Boston Mental Health. For this, I helped to train primary care and behavioral health clinicians in integrated care. I collaborated on this with Ray Walden, LCSW and  Dr. Laurie Goldman who is the director of psychology training at South End Community Health Center.  I am also part of the Grayken SUDA Group  led by Miriam Komaromy, Medical Director, working to improve substance use treatment for Black and Latino/a/x adults.