My work is broadly focused on understanding substance use and developing and evaluating effective interventions for people who need them. I currently serve as the evaluator for Kentucky’s Sobriety Treatment and Recovery Teams (START), an intervention for families who enter the child welfare system due to problematic substance use. Our ongoing evaluation of START, which has been funded through various grants since 2013, includes a randomized controlled trial and multiple quasi-experiments. Previous studies have shown that, over a 12-month period, children in families served by START are removed from the home at about half the rate of those in families receiving usual child welfare services, a significant improvement in family stability. We have also explored the association between medications for opioid use disorder and child welfare outcomes, how drug use profiles relate to the duration of child welfare cases, and the impacts of COVID-19 on program fidelity.

I also have a longstanding interest in the epidemiology of the nonmedical use of prescription drugs, particularly in understudied populations such as rural Appalachians, institutionalized youth, and women on probation and parole. This line of research, which intersects with my work on substance use in child welfare contexts, has established distinct subtypes of individuals who report nonmedical prescription drug use. More recently, we have demonstrated a positive relationship between psychological distress (e.g., PTSD) and physical pain symptoms and the likelihood of nonmedical prescription drug use.

Finally, I collaborate on a number of research projects related to substance use with other Kent School faculty, including Drs. Antle, Collins-Camargo, Harris, Winters, and Sar.