Dr. Sibille has been awarded a National Institutes of Health R01 award funded by the National Institute on Aging entitled: Health Disparities in Osteoarthritis: Biological Aging, Stress, and Pain – Modulation by Resilience Factors.
Osteoarthritis is a prevalent and debilitating age-related condition that unequally burdens African American adults compared to non-Hispanic white adults. There is a gap in knowledge regarding the transition from stress exposure to disparities in osteoarthritis-related health outcomes. The goal of this project is to investigate the trajectory from stress exposure to biological measures of aging and stress-related system dysregulation (allostatic load, telomere length, changes in brain structure/function) to ethnic group differences in osteoarthritis-related health outcomes over a four-year period. The long-term intention is to identify strategies to reduce the burden and improve health outcomes for adults with osteoarthritis.