# Developing Methods to Estimate Mediation Effects in Adaptive Interventions

> **NIH NIH K01** · MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY · 2020 · $118,045

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
The proposed K01 Mentored Research Scientist Development Award will prepare Ahnalee Brincks, Ph.D. to
lead the development of novel quantitative methods needed to understand the mechanisms through which
person-focused adaptive interventions affect drug use and addiction (DUA), including heroin and other opioid
use disorders (OUD). Dr. Brincks, Assistant Professor of Biostatistics at the Michigan State University College
of Human Medicine, will benefit from the NIDA-funded establishment of MSU's Drug Dependence Epidemiology
Training Program and National Hispanic Science Network Mentoring Program, continued with university support
under the direction of an experienced NIDA PI, Dr. Jim Anthony, who serves as here lead K01 sponsor.
Person-focused adaptive interventions (AIs) are used by clinicians make adaptations to treatment based on
participant characteristics that are observed before and after treatment starts. As promising new approaches for
clinical and preventive interventions in DUA and OUD, AIs give practitioners evidence-based tools to adjust an
intervention to fit each patient's needs as these needs evolve, to deliver the most effective intervention at the
ideal time and in the optimal dose. Current statistical approaches exist to evaluate whether AIs work and for
whom AIs are effective. However, there are no statistical tools for understanding how the AIs work at the level
of the person's experience, via supra-molecular mechanisms and mediational pathways investigated in clinical
and prevention researchcontexts. New mediation methods are needed to improve AIs via greater understanding
of intervening pathways. Identification of intervening pathways can lead to discover of new intervention targets
to be challenged or confirmed in subsequent field-driving AI trials of OUD and DUA interventions.
K01 support will strengthen Dr. Brincks' career development. In addition to studying OUD/DUA natural history
and clinical course, diagnosis and patient care services, she also will learn 1) epidemiology as applied to DUA,
their determinants and complications, defined to encompass HIV/AIDS, HCV, and other infectious diseases, 2)
current DUA interventions and their hypothesized mediators, 3) experimental designs used to build adaptive
interventions (e.g., Sequential Multiple Assignment Randomized Trials), and 4) state-of-the-science causal
approaches to mediational pathways in NIDA research. In her K01 research, her primary aim is development of
new quantitative methods to better understand mechanisms through which AIs reduce OUD and other DUA. A
second aim involves applying these methods to evaluate mediation hypotheses in AI trial data. She will launch
an independent program focused on OUD/DUA mediational pathways, extending current AI approaches beyond
clinical intervention evaluations to focus on reducing OUD/DUA incidence rates in communities, schools, and
target populations. As such, this work should have far-reaching implications ...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9948612
- **Project number:** 5K01DA046516-02
- **Recipient organization:** MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** AHNALEE M BRINCKS
- **Activity code:** K01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $118,045
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-06-15 → 2024-05-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9948612

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9948612, Developing Methods to Estimate Mediation Effects in Adaptive Interventions (5K01DA046516-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9948612. Licensed CC0.

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