LA Biomed held its annual Investigator Awards on November 14th. At this awards event and reception, Rashmi Shetgiri, MD, was honored with the Liu Young Investigator Award.
Dr. Shetgiri’s research focuses on bullying and violence prevention among children and adolescents. She has been awarded grant funding by the National Institutes of Health for her research on Latino youth violence prevention and by the Academic Pediatric Association for her research on primary-care-based bullying prevention. She also collaborates on research to examine the impact of language and cultural issues on children’s health.
Dr. Shetgiri recently published a study examining the perspectives of parents on adolescent fighting and prevention. The new study, entitled “African-American and Latino Parents’ Attitudes and Beliefs Regarding Adolescent Fighting and Its Prevention” has been published in the Journal of Child and Family Studies.
“Most violence prevention programs,” she says, “focus on school-based interventions with little involvement of families.” Their research suggests that it is critical to involve the families, especially parents, when trying to prevent adolescents from fighting.
“We see from the pediatric perspective that kids come into our offices with non-specific issues like headaches and having trouble sleeping. They feel like they can’t talk about the bullying they’re enduring and so the brain presents them as physical symptoms.”
“Bullying affects not only affects you in the short term, but it affects you in the long term,” says Dr. Shetgiri. “It affects your ability to form relationships, it is associated with anxiety and depression.”
She conducts health services research and community-based research to address racial and ethnic disparities. She also collaborates on research to examine the impact of language and cultural issues on children’s health.
“I feel very honored and grateful to have received the award,” she says. “And very lucky to work at such a supportive institution and with such wonderful colleagues.”
The Young Investigator award includes $10,000 in funding for future projects. The current plan is for the funds to go towards some pilot work on bullying, which will hopefully lead to a larger study.
