Karen L Roper, PhD, MS

Karen L Roper, PhD. is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine. She also serves as director of the Kentucky Ambulatory Network (KAN), Kentucky's primary care practice-based research network. She received her doctorate degree in General Experimental Psychology from the University of Kentucky and taught undergraduate courses in psychology and conducted research in learning and comparative cognition and also worked in clinical trials before joining the department. Training in basic psychological science inspires a close attention to underlying factors for behavior that continues in current projects, which aim toward improvement of patient care in the primary care environment. 

Often using mixed methods research methodology, recent projects include studies of physician (and often also patient) attitudes toward clinical care and motivations/behavior across many areas of interest to primary care including reproductive healthcare post Dobbs, gestational diabetes aftercare, gender-affirming care, opioid use treatment, and preventive screening for prediabetes risk and lung cancer. Grant funding to serve as an evaluation lead has also led to projects on centered on medical education curricular innovations (equity/social determinants of health, telehealth training), and stroke care process improvement .

Dr. Roper enjoys works closely with her UK clinical colleagues in family medicine: The diversity of her work reflects the practice! Involvement of medical students and residents in research projects is an especially rewarding bonus.