Jessica Jarvis, PhD, MT-BC, Assistant Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (PM&R) and former T32 Scholar, has received a K23 career development award from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Her research, titled Music listening interventions for children receiving mechanical ventilation: A mechanistic trial, represents a multidisciplinary, mixed-methods approach to study the use of listening to music to decrease stress and pain during mechanical ventilation in the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU).
While there is increasing evidence that listening to music decreases stress and pain, the mechanisms through which it impacts these outcomes is unclear, resulting in significant variability in intervention design and delivery in prior research and clinical practice. This mechanistic trial will use a within-subject randomized crossover design to compare trajectories of stress and pain biomarkers among children receiving invasive mechanical ventilation in the PICU across three conditions: 1) live music delivered by a music therapist, 2) recorded music, and 3) usual care. Realist synthesis of qualitative data from study participants, PICU providers, and hospital staff, will also be used to ascertain intervention benefits and limitations, and to co-create an implementation plan to guide personalized and equitable delivery of nonpharmacologic interventions in the PICU.
Dr. Jarvis has a multi-departmental and multi-institutional K23 mentorship team that includes: Ericka L Fink, MD, MS, and Patrick Kochanek, MD, in the Dept. of Critical Care Medicine (CCM); Amy K. Wagner, MD, Amy J. Houtrow, MD, PhD, MPH, and Amery Treble-Barna, PhD, in the Dept. of PM&R; Charity Patterson, PhD, MSPH, in the School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences; and Sheri Robb, PhD, MT-BC, at the Indiana University School of Nursing.
Jessica’s program exemplifies the remarkable collaboration between the divisions of Pediatric CCM and Pediatric Rehabilitation at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh that has developed to expand translational research and improve patient outcomes. It is another perfect example of the multi-departmental team science approach at the Safar Center–an approach that has helped to launch the careers of many young investigators who have graduated from our T32—”Training in Pediatric Neurocritical Care and Resuscitation Research,” among others. Congratulations to Jessica!