Division Director - Health Services & Outcomes Research

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Do you envision finding a meaningful role with an inclusive and compassionate team? At Children’s Mercy, we believe in making a difference in the lives of all children and shining a light of hope to the patients and families we serve. Our employees make the difference, which is why we have been recognized by U.S. News & World Report as a top pediatric hospital, for eleven consecutive years.

 

Children’s Mercy is in the heart of Kansas City – a metro abounding in cultural experiences, vibrant communities and thriving businesses. This is where our patients and families live, work and play. This is a community that has embraced our hospital and we strive to say thanks by giving back. As a leader in children’s health, we engage in meaningful programs and partnerships throughout the region so that we can improve the lives of children beyond the walls of our hospital.

Overview

The Department of Pediatrics at Children’s Mercy seeks a creative and scholarly leader to serve as Division Director of the Health Services and Outcomes Research (HSOR) division and Population Health leader to the Children’s Mercy Research Institute (CMRI). The Division Director will be responsible for leading the research, educational, and quality missions of HSOR, an academic division focused on conducting high quality, impactful research that leads to improved health outcomes and reduced health disparities for children and their families. The Division Director will foster collaborative ties throughout Children’s Mercy, bridging the division’s expertise in community and population-level health with the basic science, genomic, and clinical research enterprise across the Department of Pediatrics and CMRI.

 

This is a faculty position offering academic appointments at the University of Missouri – Kansas City School of Medicine and the Kansas University School of Medicine, rank to be commensurate with experience.

 

Established in 2013, HSOR has quickly developed a national and international reputation for impactful translational science contributing to the publication of 69 peer reviewed papers in FY 2024. HSOR has a strong record for successful extramural funding with 37 current awards, 16 of which are HSOR PI led, and with 16 applications submitted in FY 2024. HSOR faculty and staff are experts in community engaged health research; health communication; Diversity, Equity and Inclusion research; behavioral obesity discovery and intervention; and computational approaches capable of drawing insights from large and diverse data sets. Along with faculty-led independent research, HSOR is also home to the Biostatistics and Epidemiology Core (BEC), the Community Engaged Research Team, and the Formative Research Team (FRT). All three groups have exceptionally strong and accomplished leaders:

 

• The BEC is a team of faculty and staff biostatisticians who both conduct independent investigation and collaborate with researchers at Children’s Mercy, applying their range of expertise in study design and analytic methods including multi-level and mixed modeling, latent variable modeling, longitudinal models, survival analysis, patient reported outcomes, clinical trial design, and statistical genomics.

 

• The Community Engaged Research Team facilitates the CMRI Community and Youth Research Advisory Boards to promote equitable community-research partnerships. In addition, this team collaborates with CM researchers and local and regional community partners to ensure that studies address community priorities and utilize patient, caregiver, and community centered recruitment, data collection, and dissemination methods. The Community Engaged Team is a tremendous resource for all campus faculty interested in community impact research.

 

• The Formative Research Team (FRT) consults and collaborates with researchers to design studies grounded in social and behavioral theory; design and conduct rigorous in-depth interviews, focus-groups, and surveys; analyze qualitative data; and disseminate and integrate findings into interventions and their evaluations. The FRT team has used their skills to impact health service intervention research locally and internationally.

 

Through strategic team science collaboration with colleagues locally, nationally and internationally, HSOR has leveraged Children’s Mercy strengths in clinical care, genomics, and clinical pharmacology to improve care, enhance research and speed translation of best practice into the community. 

 

The foremost qualities necessary for this position is vision for the field of health outcomes research, including the use of qualitative and quantitative data as well as evolving technologies to favorably impact health research and populations. Other desired characteristics include 1) a trac