RISE Scholars - Isaretta Riley, MD, MPH

Isaretta Riley, MD, MPH
Duke University
RISE Cohort 4

I am a Pulmonary & Critical Care physician and Health Services Research Fellow at the Durham Veterans Affairs Medical Center and Duke University. I earned a B.A. in Biology, with a concentration in Animal Physiology, at Cornell University and a M.D. at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. I completed Internal Medicine residency and Pulmonary & Critical Care fellowship at Duke University Hospital and am currently obtaining a Master’sin Public Health, with a concentration in Public Health Leadership, at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. I am committed to eliminating disparities in health outcomes and quality of life of adults living with asthma. My current projects include a systematic review of interventions to improve asthma pharmacotherapy adherence in adult minority populations, the creation of an algorithm to identify asthmatics in electronic information databases that will be used to study disparities in health care at the population level, and an evaluation of policies to increase minority participation in clinical research. I am working with Dr. Ebony Boulware, Dr. Monica Kraft, Dr. Jerry Krishnan and Dr. Loretta Que.

I am committed to eliminating disparities and providing quality care to minority populations with lung disease. As an African American physician and clinical investigator, I consider it an honor and responsibility to identify and implement interventions to improve the health of populations most vulnerable to adverse health outcomes. I also consider my work a form of advocacy for those who have not traditionally been included in clinical research or who are disenfranchised from our health system. I believe there needs to be a focus on designing quality health equity interventions that incorporate the perspectives of all stakeholders. These interventions will then need to be incorporated in an institutional culture of health equity that equates quality care with equitable care.

I am participating in the Research in Implementation Science for Equity (RISE) program because I would like to augment my training in implementation science and work towards implementing a health equity initiative for pulmonary disease at Duke University Hospital.