Mary Killela, PhD, RN, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Utah College of Nursing (CON) and Huntsman Cancer Institute investigator, has been awarded a prestigious two-year, $362,684 National Cancer Institute (NCI) Pathway to Independence Award (K99/R00), the first K99/R00 award in the College's history. Killela's award, "Optimizing Artificial Intelligence for Financial Navigation Interventions Among Young Adult Cancer Survivors," will support the development of innovative artificial intelligence tools to help young adult cancer survivors better understand and navigate health insurance, ultimately reducing financial hardship and improving access to survivorship care.
“This award marks an important milestone in our mission to help young adult cancer survivors navigate the financial challenges of cancer treatment,” says Killela. “With support from the National Cancer Institute, we're leveraging artificial intelligence to develop trustworthy, accurate tools shaped by the voices and experiences of the communities they are designed to serve.”
The two-phase K99/R00 Award provides up to five years of funding. During the Mentored Phase, K99, researchers receive one to two years of mentored postdoctoral research training, and during the Independent Research Phase, R00, researchers who secure an independent, tenure-track faculty position receive up to three additional years of research funding. In the K99 phase, Killela's specific aims are to identify the necessary functions and features of an insurance navigation hybrid chatbot and to create a chatbot that can enhance and sustain those navigation approaches. In the R00 phase, she will refine the hybrid chatbot prototype to further enhance navigation and assess the feasibility, acceptability, satisfaction, and preliminary efficacy of chatbot-guided navigation.
Killela will work with an interdisciplinary mentorship team that brings together nationally recognized expertise in cancer survivorship, financial hardship, artificial intelligence, biomedical informatics, implementation science, and clinical trials. Her mentorship team includes primary mentor Anne Kirchhoff, PhD, MPH, and co-mentor Echo Warner, PhD, MPH, both at the Spencer Fox Eccles School of Medicine and Huntsman Cancer Institute investigators; co-mentor Guilherme Del Fiol, MD, PhD, of the Spencer Fox Eccles School of Medicine; and collaborators Nora Henrikson, PhD, MPH, of Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute, and Bob Wong, PhD, of the CON.
"We are incredibly proud of Mary in achieving this K99/R00 award from the National Cancer Institute," says Andrea Wallace, PhD, RN, FAAN, associate dean for research at the College. "Not only does this speak to her own ability as a postdoctoral researcher, but it also recognizes the commitment we have as nurse scientists in ensuring health care meets people where they are."
The College is a national leader in nursing research, ranking No. 27 among nursing schools in the United States for NIH research funding, with a total grant portfolio of $64 million. Killela's award reflects the College's broader commitment to community- and care-based research, and to training the next generation of nurse scientists who ensure quality care for all.