Allison A. Lewinski

As a nurse scientist and health services researcher, with a joint appointment between the Duke University School of Nursing (DUSON) and the Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System (VHA), I have acquired expertise in the areas of diabetes distress, qualitative research methods, and virtual care (e.g., telehealth, digital health) as a method of care delivery. My research focuses on the current and potential ability of virtual care interventions to reduce distress, improve self-management, increase access to evidence-based care delivery, and improve patient and population health outcomes. My collaborative and interdisciplinary research focuses on how patient-, provider-, and system-level factors influence virtual care use and outcomes. As evidence of its growing significance and impact at DUSON and the VHA, my work has been well funded, published in high-impact journals, presented at select conferences, and used to guide health system decision-making. I am a sought-after teacher and mentor because I connect my research interests to teaching students and mentees rigorous and systematic research approaches. I am frequently asked by local and national colleagues to provide guidance on distress, qualitative research methods, and virtual care approaches used in grants, projects, and manuscripts.  

My research contributions have focused on alleviating psychosocial distress, developing and implementing multi-level virtual care interventions, and enhancing qualitative methods. As a staff nurse, I witnessed the psychosocial distress of patients who experience challenges in obtaining care which led to my interest in diabetes distress. I aspire and work to improve health outcomes for individuals with chronic illness by developing equitable and sustainable multi-level virtual care interventions and assessing their implementation and adaptation. Virtual care describes any remote interaction between a patient and/or members of their care team. To achieve these goals, I use qualitative methods and implementation science approaches to enhance alignment between patient, modality, disease state, and social and environmental context; my collective assessments address for whom and what purposes, in what situations and contexts, when in a disease course or clinical activity, and in what specific ways such interventions are effective. My focus on the uptake and adoption of virtual care to address psychosocial distress considers interactions with patients, between patients and clinicians, and within health care systems and the larger population.