UF faculty member awarded national training grant

The Society of Academic Emergency Medicine has selected a University of Florida College of Medicine faculty member from among emergency medicine physicians nationwide to receive a scholarly sabbatical grant.

The society, which bestows only one of the awards each year, selected Linda Papa, M.D., a clinical assistant professor of emergency medicine, to receive the grant, which supports advanced research and education in emergency medicine.

The $60,000 grant will support six months of training to study treatments that reduce mortality associated with traumatic brain injury and improve the quality of life of those who survive. Part of the training will allow Papa to become involved in multicenter clinical studies involving traumatic brain injury patients.

As many as 2 million people each year in the United States sustain traumatic brain injuries, the leading cause of long-term disability in children and young adults.

The grant will enable the department of emergency medicine to play a key role in the UF’s growing program of traumatic brain injury research. As a result of the training provided by the grant, Papa will be able to serve as a research resource for other emergency medicine faculty, residents and medical students.

Papa’s primary mentors will be Ronald G. Marks, Ph. D., a professor of statistics at the College of Medicine, and Ronald L. Hayes, Ph. D., a professor of neuroscience and director of the Center for Traumatic Brain Injury Studies at the Evelyn F. and William L. McKnight Brain Institute of UF.