2024 Tamkin Scholars
Isha Karmacharya
Isha Karmacharya is from Nepal, currently pursuing her PhD in Social Gerontology at Miami University of Ohio. As a PhD candidate, Karmacharya’s research is centered on enhancing the quality of life and well-being of older individuals, particularly immigrants, refugee populations, and the social, mental, and physical health concerns of the Nepali-Bhutanese population in the United States.
Karen Elizabeth Schlag
Dr. Karen Schlag is a postdoctoral fellow at the Sealy Center on Aging at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. Dr. Schlag is working with Dr. Monique Pappadis to develop an elder mistreatment screening tool and support intervention for older individuals with mild cognitive impairment or dementia and their family caregivers. Her research focus also includes how social and interpersonal factors impede patients’ and families’ abilities to seek and gain access to dementia care services and support.
Kelly Marnfeldt
Kelly Marnfeldt is a doctoral candidate at USC’s Leonard Davis School of Gerontology. Her research interests reside at the intersection of vulnerability and autonomy for older people living with dementia who wish to age in place, dementia and Alzheimer’s disease as human rights issues, interventions aimed at elder abuse prevention, and interventions for victims of elder abuse, who may construct the meaning of justice in unconventional ways.Â
Stine Borgen Lund
Stine Lund is a PhD candidate who has been a nurse practitioner and researcher in Norway for the past 15 years. She has been collecting research on neglect in Norwegian nursing homes. Ms. Lund was part of a research collaborative that examined older adults and elder abuse in residential care settings. She began her career working on a large longitudinal study of patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI), and as a local coordinator of a European multicentre study of TBI patients.
WEI-LIN XUE​
Wei-Lin Xue is a PhD student in Nursing and Gerontology at Purdue University. As a nurse in Taiwan, she spent four years providing compassionate care in the palliative and hospice ward. Her current research focuses on the relational dynamics of older adults and the risk of initial elder mistreatment, as well as its recurrence. Wei-Lin is participating in the 2023-2024 National Collaboratory to Address Elder Mistreatment Mentorship Program, exploring elder mistreatment in end-of-life care.
ELIZABETH AVENT​
Dr. Elizabeth Avent is a postdoctoral fellow in the Center for the Health and Social Sciences at the University of Chicago. Her research focuses on abuse over the life course, including late-life intimate partner violence, elder abuse prevention, intervention and policy, and the impact of adverse childhood experiences into later life. Her current research aims to differentiate intimate partner violence in later life from elder mistreatment by spouses and intimate partners. Dr. Avent is currently working on a study at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, interviewing spousal and intimate caregivers about their experiences with dementia caregiving.
Georgia Anetzberger Awardee
Patricia Kimball
Ms. Kimball’s innovative work as Executive Director of the Elder Abuse Institute of Maine and founder of the Restorative Justice Institute of Maine has had a profound impact on the field of elder maltreatment. Her leadership in developing transitional housing in Maine for older victims of abuse, driving the evidence-based RISE Model, and advocating for restorative justice has received national acclaim and inspired replication. The lives and outcomes of many older adults and their loved ones have improved because of her exceptional work in the field.Â