Ms. Ashley Collinsworth, a doctoral student in the department of global health systems and development at Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, was named a 2015 SAS Student Ambassador for her work on the use of electronic health records for health services research.

The SAS Student Ambassador Program is a competitive program designed to recognize and support students who are using SAS analytics software in innovative ways that benefit their respective fields of study.

Her presentation and the related paper were entitled “Health Services Research Utilizing Electronic Health Record Data: A Grad Student ‘How-To’ Paper.” In it, she provides basic tools for graduate students to conduct health services research using electronic health record (EHR) data.  Her work, under the guidance of Dr. Claudia Campbell, is based on a study of delirium prevention and mitigation in intensive care units funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. It highlights the analyses she performed in SAS as part of her dissertation to examine the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of the ABCDE (Awakening and Breathing Coordination, Delirium monitoring/management, and Early exercise/mobility) bundle. In the paper, she examines SAS tools, gives step-by-step coding examples, and discusses challenges and lessons learned working with EHR data.

Ms. Collinsworth presented her research at the SAS Global Forum, the world’s largest gathering of SAS users attended by more than 3,500 business and IT users of SAS software and solutions.

“I was honored to serve as a SAS student ambassador and to represent the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine’s Executive Doctor of Science Program,” she says.

“With more and more students realizing the value of analytics expertise to research and their careers, the competition to be named a SAS Student Ambassador has never been fiercer,” said Dr. Jerry Oglesby, senior director for the SAS Global Academic Program and Global Certification. “We applaud them for brilliant research that advances the knowledge in their fields.”