HEAL Community Partner Committee

Kevin Charles is a certified Peer Specialist and Recovery Coach with  Family and Medical Counseling, Inc., a nonprofit community-based human service and health care center in Washington, D.C. He also is a member of the Howard University Community Advisory Board. He enjoys advocating for the population that he serves.

Emily A. Haozous, Ph.D., RN, FAAN (Chiricahua Fort Sill Apache) is a Research Scientist at PIRE Southwest, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Dr. Haozous’ research is guided by the health and wellness priorities of the Native American partners with whom she collaborates. Her scholarship focuses on social justice and health equity, with a specific interest in addressing early mortality, end of life care, cancer symptom management, and health promotion across the lifespan.

Jessica Hulsey Nickel is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Addiction Policy Forum, a national nonprofit organization that helps patients, families, and communities affected by substance use disorders. She has worked in the field of addiction, from community-based prevention to treatment to the policy arena, for 25 years.

Kristin (Kri) Korte is a peer recovery coach/alcohol and drug counselor who works for the CARE Perinatal Behavioral Health Service Clinic at Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, and Washington University in St. Louis supporting the HEALthy Brain and Child Development (HBCD) research program, helping pregnant/postnatal moms navigate their struggles. She has been in recovery for more than 13 years and is passionate about helping others with an SUD.

Bianca Landaeta works for the Georgia Council on Substance Abuse, a statewide organization that conducts advocacy, training, and education, and provides peer recovery support services, as part of the recovery community organization development team. She helps with the expansion of services to Hispanic, immigrant, and refugee populations around the state of Georgia.

Tom Norris is a patient advisor to the BACPAC study site at Cedars Sinai hospital in Los Angeles. Since retiring after a long career in the U.S. Air Force, he has been an active advocate for others who suffer from chronic pain.

Philip Rutherford is the Chief Operating Officer at Faces & Voices of Recovery, a national recovery-focused advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C. He is a recovery coach and a passionate member of the recovery community. Mr. Rutherford is experienced in substance use disorders, recovery, reentry, and cultural competency.

Stephanie G. Smith is an individual living with chronic pain due to osteoarthritis and is committed to sharing her personal journey with pain management with other individuals with lived experience. She holds a B.S. degree in psychology from Howard University in Washington, D.C., and has worked for nationwide sales organizations. She participated in a HEAL-funded research study testing non-surgical methods for reducing knee pain in patients with knee osteoarthritis.

Jonathon Valdez is an accountant with the University of New Mexico health sciences center and has supported several NIH studies including the HEALthy Brain and Child Development study. He is a military veteran with an M.B.A. in accounting.

Christin Veasley is the Co-Founder and Director of the Chronic Pain Research Alliance (CPRA), a research-focused advocacy initiative for individuals living with chronic overlapping pain conditions. CPRA is an initiative of the TMJ Association, a nonprofit patient advocacy organization based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She has lived with chronic pain since surviving a near-fatal accident in her teens, which led her to pursue a science degree and to enter the pain research advocacy community. Her life’s work has focused on advancing rigorous pain research and expediting the translation of scientific discoveries into meaningful clinical change for those living with chronic pain.

The NIH HEAL Initiative^® views engagement with people with lived experience throughout the research process as a fundamental value.