Dr. Taona Haderlein is an investigator II at OCHIN. She is a health services researcher and clinical psychologist. Taona has worked with OCHIN since 2024 and is a part-time lecturer in the Department of Population and Public Health Sciences within Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California. Taona uses data science and informatics tools to study health equity, care coordination, and the intersection of these topics in the digital health context. She currently studies participatory AI-based methods for measuring and improving care coordination in minoritized populations. She is also focused on improving digital health accessibility.
Telehealth is a convenient, cost-effective strategy for delivering health services. Taona’s work in this area has examined digital health use, experiences, and effectiveness. Recently, she received funding as principal investigator (PI) to examine video versus text-based (i.e., secure messaging) digital health use among hard of hearing individuals. Taona also received funding as PI for research examining associations between telehealth delivery and same-day access to VA integrated care. Previously, she served as PI for a study that found higher telehealth uptake, but lower overall health care use, among racial and ethnic minority individuals during COVID-19. Taona’s earlier research examined the effectiveness of internet-delivered health interventions.
The COVID-19 pandemic brought longstanding health disparities to the forefront. Taona’s work in this area has involved the analysis of national electronic health record datasets to examine temporal changes, and between-group differences, in health care utilization during COVID-19. For example, she led a study reporting lower Veterans Affairs (VA) COVID-19 vaccination rates among American Indian/Alaska Native (AIAN) veterans compared to white veterans; however, this difference was found only for AIANs living near an Indian Health Service (IHS) facility, illustrating potential use of IHS as a safety net. Another paper Taona first-authored reported that despite prior research reporting higher vaccination barriers among patients with serious mental illness, in the VA COVID-19 vaccination rates were similar for people with and without serious mental illness. Taona also led work reporting higher rates of COVID-19 testing, but lower COVID-19 test positivity, among VA patients diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Racial/ethnic minorities are susceptible to psychosocial stress from myriad factors, including ongoing systemic racism. To investigate this issue, Taona led a paper examining associations between perceived discrimination and depressive symptoms, as well as poor academic functioning, among young Latino/as. Taona found that perceived discrimination is a significant predictor of depression and poor academic functioning, and that relinquished control, which is conceptualized as a facet of learned helplessness, mediates these associations. Another study Taona led examined racial differences in perceived weight and attractiveness. The results indicated that while weight and self-perceived attractiveness are significantly associated for white women, Black women place less emphasis on weight in evaluating their own attractiveness. This study provided support for emphasizing factors other than appearance when addressing health behavior change in Black populations.
Taona’s research in this area has focused on examining interrelations between psychosocial aspects of substance use behaviors. Taona co-authored manuscripts examining correlates of substance abuse. In one study, she and colleagues found that marijuana use is associated with perceived peer and parent behavioral norms. Taona also contributed to the development of a measure assessing motives for pre-partying, i.e., drinking in anticipation of social events.
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