Dr. Kelly Shaffer is an Associate Professor in the Center for Behavioral Health and Technology at the University of Virginia School of Medicine. She is a licensed clinical psychologist with specialized training in psycho-oncology and behavioral research methods. Her research aims to expand access to evidence-based behavioral health care among cancer survivors and their families through the use of digital health. She is particularly interested in areas of care that are under-addressed in current oncology practice - namely, psychosocial care for family caregivers and sexual health care for female cancer survivors.

Dr. Shaffer's R37-funded project aims to develop a fully-automated Internet intervention to improve sexual well-being among breast cancer survivors. This study will use the Multiphase Optimization Strategy research framework and a factorial trial design to identify the optimal package of intervention components that balances efficacy (improvement of survivors' sexual concerns) with participant burden (inclusion of only effective components). Breast cancer survivors will be enrolled from oncology clinics across the U.S. through a strategic partnership with the Wake Forest Research Base of the NCI Community Oncology Research Program (NCORP). This study advances cancer-related sexual health intervention science by rigorously testing how sexual health intervention components work through mediation analyses and identifying for whom components work best through moderator analyses.