Office of Research Team

Romana Hasnain-Wynia, PhD, Chief of Academic Affairs
Romana Hasnain-Wynia, PhD (she/her/hers) oversees Denver Health’s academic mission in research, education and public health through the Office of Academic Affairs and Public Health to further Denver Health’s role as a learning health system advancing equity. She is also a Professor of Medicine at the University of Colorado, School of Medicine. She served as the Chief Research Officer at Denver Health for six years, where she provided strategic direction for research and sponsored programs. She mentors junior and mid-career investigators at Denver Health and the University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus. She currently co-directs the HRSA funded T-32 post-doctoral training fellowship in Health Services and Outcomes Research in primary care.

Prior to joining Denver Health, Dr. Hasnain-Wynia served as the director of the Addressing Disparities program at the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute where she provided strategic oversight for the program’s national funding priorities. She was the director of the Center for Health Care Equity and Associate Professor at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, and she spent a decade at the American Hospital Association’s Health Research and Educational Trust as Vice President of Research. Her research focuses on advancing equity in health care with an emphasis on developing and integrating equity measurement in delivery and payment models. Her research and mentorship activities emphasize generating and using real world evidence. She serves on several national advisory panels and is on the editorial boards of the journals Health Affairs and Health Services Research.

Holly M. Frost
Holly M. Frost, MD FAAP (she/her/hers) is the Senior Director of the Center for Health Systems Research, a senior research scientist and pediatrician at Denver Health. She is also an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Colorado. Dr. Frost’s work focuses on using learning health systems and research to rapidly improve care for patients. Her personal research portfolio focuses on pragmatic trials for antimicrobial stewardship and best practices for management of common outpatient infections including acute otitis media and conjunctivitis.

Amanda Breeden
Amanda Breeden, MA, CRA, (she/her/hers) is the Senior Director of the Sponsored Programs and Research Office and Research Operations in the Office of Research where she provides oversight to a team of grant management, grant accounting, grant contracts and research operations staff. In addition to working in lean-driven grant administrative and operations, Amanda spent years as a grant writer and awardee and served as a peer reviewer for federal grant applications. She holds the CRA certification.

Kym Fash
Kym Fash, CRA, CCRP, (she/her/hers) is the Associate Director of the Sponsored Programs and Research Office (SPARO). She has been working full time in grants administration since 2007 and has experience with multiple funders, including NIH, NASA, NSF, ASPR, AHRQ, and various other federal, foundation and industry partners. Kym also oversees the contracts group within SPARO.

Deborah Rinehart
Deborah Rinehart, PhD, (she/her/hers) is the Associate Director of the Research Methods Core and a senior research scientist in the Center for Health Systems Research in the Office of Research at Denver Health and an associate professor in the School of Medicine at the University of Colorado. Dr. Rinehart’s research utilizes qualitative and quantitative methods to develop and evaluate the impact of behavioral health interventions and healthcare services. Her research focus is on improving sexual and reproductive health among populations who experience disparities, improving treatment engagement and retention among newly induced buprenorphine patients and patients with methamphetamine induced psychosis, and on research to reduce harm related to substance use.

Kelley Mancine
Kelley Mancine, MBA, (she/her/hers) is the Associate Director of Research Operations, where she oversees the Clinical Trials Services Team and the Shared Research Staffing team, research lab services and all research data capture services. With a love of A3 process improvement and lean management, Kelley strives to find efficient solutions to complex research processes and to manage her team with a people-centered approach.

Laura Jean Podewils
Laura Jean Podewils, PhD, (she/her/hers) is the Associate Director of Learning Health Systems and Evaluation in the Center for Health Systems Research, where she manages a team of biostatisticians, epidemiologists, data analysts and research associates. She also provides mentorship to PhD and MPH students as an adjunct faculty member in the Department of Epidemiology at the Colorado School of Public Health. Dr. Podewils’s research focuses on addressing social and structural barriers to health, including housing and food insecurity, barriers related to identity, language, culture and justice involvement.