\u201cWe will bring expertise to CHERISH related to health disparities and the social determinants of health,\u201d says Dr. Linda Sprague Martinez, director of the UConn Health Disparities Institute. \u201cI am excited about the opportunity to contribute to the CHERISH mission. The Health Disparities Institute will implement consensus building techniques that will enhance the work of the Population Data Modeling Core by identifying meaningful population level variables.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cCollaboration is key to advancing health equity, and the way we collaborate matters just as much,\u201d shares Gillian Betz, MPH, CHSE of the UConn\u00a0Health Disparities Institute. \u201cI am thrilled to be part of the Population Data Modeling Core, a multidisciplinary team using population-level data to identify strategies that improve care for people who use substances and challenge stigma\u201d<\/p>\n
Betz of UConn adds, \u201cAt HDI, we bring an equity lens that enhances these data-driven approaches by centering the needs and lived experiences of community members. Through this partnership, we will cultivate a co-learning, equity-driven environment that uplifts the justice-aligned goals of CHERISH.\u201d<\/p>\n
In addition, new colleagues lending their expertise to CHERISH include Weill Cornell Medicine, Ali Jalali will serve as the CHERISH Methodology Core co-director and bring his expertise in advanced econometric and statistical methods; Jonathan Purtle from New York University and Julia Hinckley, Karl Stark, and M Davis from the University of Pennsylvania will enhance the CHERISH Dissemination & Policy Core through policy engagement strategies and implementation science research.<\/p>\n \u201cOur combined expertise as health economists, simulation modelers, clinician researchers, dissemination scientists, and policy experts play synergistic roles in sharpening our data collection and analysis, and the dissemination of findings about the care of people with SUD, HCV, and HIV,\u201d said Benjamin Linas, who will direct the CHERISH Population Data & Modeling Core with Jake Morgan, the newly appointed core co-director, with the support of Dimitri Baptiste and Hana Zwick from the Syndemics Lab.<\/p>\n To support decisions about embracing new approaches, CHERISH assists researchers in considering both clinical and economic outcomes.<\/p>\n \u201cEconomic evaluations can provide a holistic view of an intervention\u2019s costs and benefits, from multiple decision-maker perspectives,\u201d said Sean Murphy, who will newly serve as the CHERISH co-director. \u201cSUD interventions can be costly from a payer\u2019s perspective, which is why it is critical that it is viewed alongside relevant downstream cost-offsets and non-financial benefits, such as improved quality-of-life,\u201d Murphy explained.<\/p>\n In the new cycle, CHERISH will develop research to support the financial sustainability of SUD interventions, advance research methodologies, and accelerate the knowledge translation and exchange of information between researchers and decision makers.<\/p>\n The next five years build on previous grant cycles where CHERISH led research to inform the integration of substance use treatment into systems of care and captured the economic and clinical impact of SUD and HCV\/HIV interventions at the individual-, system-, and community-level.<\/p>\n Assembling Early-career Researchers and State Decision Makers <\/strong><\/p>\n Responding to the rapidly changing SUD and related HCV\/HIV landscape requires extensive collaboration between clinical and health economics researchers, ongoing communication with decision makers, and career mentorship within the field.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s only a small pool of researchers that has the requisite training and expertise to conduct cross-disciplinary health economics research,\u201d said Yuhua Bao, who will serve as the new CHERISH Pilot Grant, Training & Mentoring Core director. \u201cThis pool is only going to dwindle unless we make deliberate efforts in training and mentoring,\u201d Bao added. To address the gap, CHERISH will continue to provide support through pilot grant awards, health economics methods training, and targeted mentoring, and will build connections through the CHERISH Research Affiliates program, a national network of SUD economics and health services research experts.<\/p>\n To turn evidence into practice, CHERISH will host seminars to facilitate critical conversations with leaders at the federal, state, and local level. \u201cMaintaining channels for constructive dialogue will be critical as both the syndemic and the financing mechanisms for health care evolve,\u201d said Zachery Meisel, CHERISH Dissemination & Policy Core director.<\/p>\n CHERISH Looking Ahead<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cBudget changes or constraints often stand in the way of implementing or sustaining evidence-based practices,\u201d said Kathryn McCollister, the CHERISH Methodology Core director. \u201cIn our newest chapter of CHERISH, we\u2019re eager to share our expertise with other researchers so they can leverage our tools and methodologies to relay the full impact of investing in SUD, HCV, and HIV health interventions,\u201d McCollister said.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Learn more about this news<\/a> and CHERISH<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" UConn experts joining CHERISH, a multi-institutional Center of Excellence funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, are Linda Sprague Martinez, Ph.D. and Gillian Betz, MPH<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":98,"featured_media":235171,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2429,1868,179,2233],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[1873],"class_list":["post-235168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-awards-scholarships","category-meds","category-uconn-health","category-university-news"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-30 12:27:18","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/98"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235168"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235168\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":235174,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235168\/revisions\/235174"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/235171"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235168"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=235168"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=235168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"CHERISH](\"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/CHERISH-Main-Post-1600-x-1200-3-CHERISH-2025-2030-1024x768.jpeg\")