- Stacie Dusetzina, who earned her PhD at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, returns as an assistant professor.
- Dusetzina studies how medications are used in large patient populations and how insurance policies and reimbursement decisions affect treatment use.
Stacie B. Dusetzina, PhD, has been appointed as an assistant professor in the Division of Pharmaceutical Outcomes and Policy in the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. She also has a faculty appointment at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health in the Department of Health Policy and Management and is a member of the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research, and the Carolina Health Informatics Program.
Sixteen years ago, Dusetzina came to UNC as an undergraduate student. After earning her PhD from the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy in 2010, she went north to carry out postdoctoral research at Harvard Medical School in the Department of Health Care Policy.
“It is a wonderful experience to return to your home,” Dusetzina says. “I feel I have grown up during my time away from the school. My experiences as a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard and as an assistant professor in the School of Medicine at UNC were excellent opportunities to grow as a researcher and allowed me to build connections and expand my research network in ways that will benefit my career and the careers of my colleagues and mentees.”
Dusetzina’s research is at the intersection of pharmacy and public health. As the principal investigator of two studies, she strives to understand how medications are used in large patient populations and how insurance policies and reimbursement decisions affect treatment use.
Dusetzina is researching depression and pain therapies in patients newly diagnosed with breast or colorectal cancer. She has funding from the Building Interdisciplinary Research Careers in Women’s Health program, which supports research career development in those who have recently completed clinical training or postdoctoral fellowships. The BIRCWH K grant was awarded through the North Carolina Translational and Clinical Sciences Institute.
She is also studying parity laws, which are intended to improve access to orally administered cancer treatments. With an R01-equivalent grant from the American Cancer Society, she will look at the true effect of these policies on both patients and health plans.
“My research will remain very much the same as I make the transition to this new position,” Dusetzina says. “I’m excited to get involved with my new colleagues and engage more fully with PhD and PharmD students.”
By Abigail Brewer