My research program is supported by three active awards from the National Institute on Aging and is concentrated on examining the organization of the clinical workforce in nursing homes and the quality of care provided by these facilities. For example, I have multiple projects underway to examine whether physicians and advanced practitioners who primarily practice in nursing homes, often referred to as “SNFists,” provide higher quality of care to residents than other clinicians.
Since the spring of 2020, I have also committed a substantial amount of effort towards studies examining the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on nursing homes, producing among the first studies to identify the characteristics of facilities associated morbidity and mortality of individuals residing in them. This includes an analysis of nursing home characteristics associated with resident COVID-19 morbidity in communities with high infection rates, in addition to the first study to outline federal and state responses addressing COVID-19 in nursing homes.