Akela Byrne
Qualitative Assessment of Health Provider and Community Member Perspectives of Perinatal Nutrition Research Needs in Alaska
UAF Sophomore
B.S. Biological Sciences/ Pre-Nursing
Akela is a 2024-2025 Community-Engaged Learning Award Recipient.
There is a large bias in healthcare research, shown by the lack of research within minority groups (Mistry et al. 2023). In Alaska, it is especially important to get multiple communities' perspectives, representing the ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic backgrounds of Alaskans. Supporting the development of the Alaska Lactation and Perinatal Nutrition (ALPeN) Community Advisory Board (CAB), my project will utilize qualitative assessment of Community Members versus Health Professionals to understand the priorities and perspectives of these groups. These data are important in informing how we scaffold the ALPeN CAB and start the work to alleviate the presumed gap of knowledge.
How is your project going so far this semester?
[While I started my URSA project on-campus,] studying abroad this semester has created new challenges for working on the project, such as time-zone changes, and the school-life balance while adjusting to a new country. However, I have been working through these challenges, and we now have almost all the data for the project! It has been exciting seeing all the different ways that healthcare providers think as barriers to breastfeeding, especially with all the different types of healthcare providers we have in the focus groups. I have also been working with another team member coding our data, which has been a learning experience for me, and I am excited to analyze it and see how Alaska compares to the rest of the US!
How did you find out about URSA and what encouraged you to submit an application for funding?
I first found out about URSA during a campus tour about 3 years ago. I thought it was a cool program, but hadn't really thought much about it after that because it seemed almost out of reach to me. I had never thought I had the skills to be part of a research team. Then, while on campus, I started to hear about my peers' URSA projects and my mindset started to change. I got in touch with Erin, said I wanted to do research of any kind to just dip my toes in the water, and see what it was like. She then sent me an email about a project Dr. Julie Avery was leading about perinatal nutrition and breastfeeding in Alaska, and I created an idea of a project from there. I have been working with Dr. Avery and her team ever since.
How does your URSA project relate to your career or personal goals?
My URSA project on breastfeeding and perinatal nutrition relates to my career goals in that I want to be a nurse. With nursing, I believe it is good to understand research and what goes into it as major parts of my career, from the drugs I administer, to the way I treat patients, are founded on years of research. A major part of what I have personally learned from the focus groups is that breastfeeding is not taught as much as it should be. So I will learn to be a better nurse to pregnant patients and patients with infants now as a direct result of this research. It also relates to my personal goals because I wanted to prove to myself that research is something I could do, as before I thought it was not something I could achieve.
If you could share one piece of advice with students interested in pursuing URSA in the future, what would you say?
I would say that learning to "roll with the punches" when it comes to research is essential. There have been several things during this project such as approval timelines, growing community interest, narrowing down a research question, and studying abroad, that have created challenges for the project. Learning to roll with the punches, and that it is okay when things don't turn out as you expect, has been my largest takeaway from the project. Reach out when you need help because it is okay not to know how to do things as you are learning!