Spotlight on Family Medicine Research Faculty Sonya Brady, PhD, LP: Part 2
Dr. Sonya Brady received her PhD in Clinical Psychology and Biological/Health Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh. She completed her clinical psychology internship at the University of Illinois at Chicago Institute for Juvenile Research, and a two-year postdoctoral research fellowship in health psychology at the University of California, San Francisco. Prior to joining the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health (DFMCH), Dr. Brady conducted research and taught courses within the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. In the DFMCH, Dr. Brady divides her time between conducting research and providing behavioral health care at M Health Fairview Smiley’s Clinic.
What kind of advice might you give someone who is considering a research faculty position?
My advice stems from my own experience. If someone has a background in providing health services, even if they're coming into a position to conduct research, I would recommend spending a portion of their time in a clinic providing direct services. It is rewarding to sit with someone and have them trust you with their stories, to have them look to you for guidance on how they can better cope. Speaking as a psychologist, that is a rewarding experience in itself.
In addition to that, we can glean ideas about research topics that could better benefit the communities that we serve. We're working directly with people and we're hearing about what's most important to them, what's most impactful from their perspective. We can design research questions accordingly.
In the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health, we have faculty from a broad array of disciplinary backgrounds, including faculty who are not providing direct services. What we have in common is a focus on community health. We not only provide direct services to families in clinical spaces; we try to promote the health of whole communities.
In the Program in Health Disparities Research, there is a great tradition of community-engaged research, and across our department, we have individuals who care passionately about communities. Community-engaged research is something that I would recommend. Having community partners, making sure that the research we do is relevant to communities, community members letting us know what questions we should be asking, and ideally, ensuring that community members are involved every step of the way.
Community members can provide guidance after data is collected, too. How do we interpret our findings? How do we share our findings with others in a way that can most positively impact communities? Any research question or research ideas that someone might have can benefit from working directly with patients in clinics or working with community members to do community-engaged research.
What do you hope to accomplish as you look toward the future?
I hope to continue my research on health equity. I want to continue examining social determinants of health. What's different in our society today is that some are questioning the value of such research. I would just say that we all benefit from the promotion of health equity. This is not a zero sum game. If one community is able to achieve greater health, it doesn't mean that another community suffers. We can all benefit. We can all enhance our well-being and health. The way we identify who is most in need of opportunities to better health is by looking at health disparities and by promoting health equity. It's very important to share with others how impactful that research is and how it benefits our whole society.
Since I started working in M Health Fairview Clinic - Smiley's and as part of the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health, I've become very interested in integrated care, which is now what I'm part of in a primary care clinic. I'm part of a team of providers. We have medical doctors and nurses, we have pharmacists, we have psychiatrists as well as psychologists, we have social workers, care coordinators, and other staff who take care of the patient as a whole person.
What is the best way to offer that type of integrated care and what are the benefits of that care for others? How can we show the benefits for communities? I would hypothesize that it makes sense to invest in that type of integrated care because it benefits a society in the long run. It’s important to provide care proactively and emphasize prevention as much as possible. Doing research on the type of care in which I'm now actively engaged is something that interests me.
How do you see family medicine taking shape in the future?
I appreciate the leadership that we have during this time of uncertainty in our research community. One of the things I appreciate about that leadership is how collaborative it is and how we have conversations where everyone is invited to communicate what they're thinking, to share in the generation of ideas for our department. That emphasis on collaboration and integration should remain strong. I'd like to see the integrated care in our department adopted by more family medicine clinics.
We need to continue to embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion as well. We should not shy away from that. If we embrace it, the families and the communities that we serve will be more likely to engage with us.
In one of my recent papers, we looked separately at the impact of discriminatory experiences among Black women and white women. Black women reported more discrimination than white women. That was true for discrimination based on race or color, discrimination based on socioeconomic status or social position, and discrimination based on gender. When women reported discrimination, Black and white women found it equally distressing. Frequency of exposure to discrimination impacted bladder health negatively among both Black and white women.
So the things that we're studying impact everybody who experiences them. And if we stop research on specific topics, it impacts every community in a negative way.
