Lauren Van Scoy, MD - Penn State Cancer Institute
Researcher Profile
Lauren Van Scoy, MD
Division of Pulmonary, Allergy and Critical Care Medicine
Professor, Department of Humanities
Professor, Department of Public Health Sciences
Associate Professor, Department of Medicine
Associate Professor, Department of Humanities
Associate Professor, Department of Public Health Sciences
Research Interests
Dr. Lauren Van Scoy's current and ongoing research activities use qualitative and mixed methodology to evaluate innovative communication tools in variety of areas, including advance care planning and engaging patients and their families in discussions about end-of-life issues. She has expertise in mixed methods and qualitative research and is the co-founder and co-director of Penn State Clinical and Translational Science Institute's Qualitative and Mixed Methods Core, along with Dr. Heather Stuckey, MEd, DEd.
Dr. Van Scoy’s research has been funded by the National Institute of Health, including projects related to the rigorous assessment of communication quality using a methodology she co-developed with collaborator Allison Scott, PhD (University of Kentucky).
She is the director of Project Talk, a research program that studies the impact of innovative conversational tools, including an end-of-life conversation game ("Hello") and an novel graphic ICU communication tool (Let's Talk).
Most recently, she partnered with the Hospice Foundation of America to lead a national community-engagement project to evaluate and disseminate the "Hello" across 27 states and more than 1,200 people living in underserved communities.
Dr. Van Scoy serves as a methodology consultant for a wide variety of mixed-method projects and topics. She has served as a qualitative and mixed-methods consultant on a variety of projects, including large, randomized controlled trials, pharmacological drug trials and education projects. In addition to her NIH funding, Dr. Van Scoy's work has been supported by the Parker B. Francis Foundation, Society for Critical Care Medicine, John and Wauna Harman Foundation, Penn State's Huck Institutes for the Life Sciences and others.
- Advance Care Planning
- Pandemics
- Randomized Controlled Trials
- Decision Making
- Public Health
- Health
- Neoplasms
- Coronavirus
- Cross-Sectional Studies
- Terminal Care
- Vaccines
- Delivery of Health Care