Georgia State University and Augusta University will provide one-year grants totaling nearly $200,000 to support four research collaborations among faculty from both institutions with a focus on health and healthcare delivery in Georgia.

“This work is very relevant to a number of significant concerns in Georgia, including the COVID-19 pandemic and rural healthcare delivery,” said Michael Eriksen, interim vice president for research and economic development at Georgia State. “By combining our faculty’s expertise in infectious and chronic diseases, public health and health information systems, we hope to make progress in better serving all Georgians.”

“We’re excited to expand our partnership with Georgia State University for research that works to improve the health of Georgians,” said Michael Diamond, senior vice president for research at Augusta University. “The combined expertise of two of Georgia’s most preeminent research universities provides a lot of natural synergies for tackling health care and public health concerns disproportionally impacting our state.”

The grants are as follows:

• $44,984 to fund an examination of the impacts and effects of telestroke therapy in Georgia, conducted by Aaron Baird, associate professor of health administration in Georgia State’s J. Mack Robinson College of Business; Adam Berman, chief of the Division of Health Economics and Modeling and director of Cardiac Arrhythmia Ablation Services at the Medical College of Georgia and Augusta University Health System; Yichen Cheng, assistant professor in the Institute for Insight at the J. Mack Robinson College of Business; and Yusen Xia, the Bradford and Patricia Ferrer professor of analytics and director of the Institute for Insight at the J. Mack Robinson College of Business.

• $50,000 to fund an investigation of virus genetic variation and antibody responses against SARS-CoV-2 in COVID-19 patients in Georgia, conducted by Chris Basler, professor and director of the Center for Microbial Pathogenesis at Georgia State and a Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar; and Jose Vasquez, chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University.

• $50,000 to fund a pilot evaluation of a mobile health intervention for smoking cessation in rural and urban Georgia, conducted by Claire Spears, associate professor of health policy and behavioral sciences in the School of Public Health at Georgia State; and Martha Tingen, associate director for cancer prevention, control and population health at the Georgia Cancer Center at Augusta University.

• $49,169 to fund a feasibility study of mobile health services as part of child maltreatment interventions, conducted by Shannon Self-Brown, professor in the School of Public Health at Georgia State and co-director of the National SafeCare Training and Research Center; and Ashwini Tiwari, assistant professor in the Institute of Public and Preventive Health at Augusta University.