Research Health Scientist/Associate Professor
Durham VA Health Care System and Duke University Department of Population Health Sciences
Dr. Sperber is a health services researcher with expertise in using mixed-methods to study implementation of new health care practices within health care systems. Dr. Sperber received a PhD from the Department of Health Behavior at the Gillings School of Global Public Health in 2010 and completed an AHRQ health services research post-doctoral fellowship at the Duke University School of Medicine and the Durham VA Health Care System in 2012. She currently works as an Associate Professor at the Duke University School of Medicine Department of Population Health Sciences and core investigator with the Durham VA Center to Accelerate Discovery and Practice Transformation (ADAPT). Dr. Sperber leads a National Human Genome Research Institute grant to identify best practices for implementing genetic testing during drug prescribing: this project involves collecting qualitative and quantitative data about implementation determinants and strategies and individual characteristics of ordering providers (such as provider discipline and number of years practicing) at four health care systems that have adopted pharmacogenomics to varying degrees and using a mathematical algorithm to specify necessary and sufficient conditions (and clusters of conditions) for higher rates of orders. In another project, she collaborates with colleagues from Biostatistics and Bioinformatics and Duke Health to use approaches from the field of System Dynamics to engage multiple stakeholder groups (users, developers, implementers, owners) to co-identify common barriers and facilitators, and their interactions, to adoption of the Early Warning Score clinical decision support model, which has been adopted well in some settings and not others. For the VA, Dr. Sperber directs a cross-functional team that conducts rapid turnaround projects for high priority needs by VHA national, regional, and facility leaders.