News Release

2006 DeFriese Award Winners Named

April 4, 2006

The UNC Institute on Aging is pleased to announce the 2006 winners of the Gordon H. DeFriese Career Development in Aging Research Awards. These annual awards honor Dr. DeFriese's thirty-year distinguished career in the conduct and development of research to improve the quality of lives of older North Carolinians, and especially his unwavering commitment to developing and supporting the careers of his colleagues. The awards are given to one junior faculty/staff member and one doctoral student from UNC Chapel Hill who demonstrate commitment to and outstanding promise in aging research.

Mary T. Roth, PharmD, MHS is this year's faculty/staff awardee. Dr. Roth is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Pharmaceutical Outcomes and Policy at the School of Pharmacy and a Research Assistant Professor in the Division of Geriatric Medicine in the School of Medicine. Dr. Roth has served as co-investigator on numerous aging research projects that focus particular attention to optimizing medication use in older adults with chronic diseases. She recently proposed a five-year National Institute on Aging (NIA) K-23 Career Development Award to develop and pilot test an innovative medication management program to improve the quality of medication use and health outcomes for older adults. Dr. Roth received an outstanding priority score on this application and is awaiting final official notice of the grant award. This research proposal couples data from a one-year cohort study, funded by the American College of Clinical Pharmacy, to estimate the prevalence and incidence of drug therapy problems experienced by community-dwelling older adults, with a series of qualitative studies that she will conduct with patients, pharmacists and physicians. Dr. Roth has also received a three-year award from The Duke Endowment that supports the development and implementation of the medication management program. She has been actively publishing in the pharmacotherapy journals and has made numerous aging-related presentations at national and state conferences. In addition to her classroom teaching on geriatric care, she serves as a co-preceptor for the geriatric clinical clerkship for pharmacy students and a faculty advisor for pharmacy students enrolled in the UNC Interdisciplinary Certificate in Aging program. Dr. Roth received her PharmD and completed a Pharmacy residency at the St. Louis College of Pharmacy and her Master of Health Sciences in Clinical Research at the Duke University School of Medicine. She is a fellow of the American College of Clinical Pharmacy and a member of the Phi Lambda Sigma Pharmacy Leadership Society.

Tiffany E. Shubert, MPT, is this year's doctoral student awardee. She is a student in the Department of Human Movement Science and is also a predoctoral fellow in the Carolina Program in Health and Aging Research training program at the UNC Institute on Aging that is funded by the National Institute on Aging. Ms. Shubert’s career goals are to become a faculty member in physical therapy and to develop and implement evidence-based fall prevention health promotion programs for community-dwelling older adults. Her doctoral research focuses on developing an innovative questionnaire tool that quantifies the social, cognitive, physical and exercise activities for older adults which can potentially be used to identify individuals at risk of poor physical and cognitive function. Ms. Shubert is a licensed physical therapist working in the UNC Interdisciplinary Geriatric Clinic, and she has served as a project coordinator, data collector or study evaluator for various funded research projects including exercise interventions for community-dwelling seniors, motor recovery after stroke, osteoarthritis mobility and pain management, and the effectiveness of exercise for patients with end-stage renal disease. In addition, Ms. Shubert teaches aging-related physical assessments and interventions to medical and physical therapy students, and supervises research projects for undergraduate and master’s level students. She is first author or co-author of publications in The Gerontologist and Geriatric Physical Therapy and she has received several geriatrics awards from the American Physical Therapy Association. Ms. Shubert received her MPT at the University of California San Francisco/San Francisco State University.

Congratulations to both recipients! The award recognition ceremony will be held at a later date.

More information on the Gordon H. DeFriese Career Development in Aging Research Awards, including past winners, is available from our Funding & Awards page.