b'Raina MerchantDr. Merchant is also researching ways to reduce 2014 Health Leader loneliness. She and her colleagues are helping people find friends, connect with other people, Raina Merchant, M.D., is an and volunteer. By being more engaged in their associate vice president at Penncommunities, people can lead healthier lives, Medicine and associate professor she says.of emergency medicine at theUniversity of Pennsylvania. She is director of Dr. Merchant loves to do research because the Penn Medicine Center for Digital Health. she thinks it makes a difference for people with health problems. If someone needs help, she Over the past six years, Dr. Raina Merchantwants to make sure they know where to go for has been doing a lot more teaching, traveling,medical care. and training. She also is mentoring a lot more, helping medical students and other people inFor me, its really fun because I get to do the healthcare field. Shes giving them advicethings that can actually make a difference in about their careers.peoples health, she says.And she has continued her research on theHer biggest accomplishment since 2014 has health of the heart. Dr. Merchant says shebeen to develop tools that collect information feels lucky to work on research projects thatthat doctors can use in the hospital to treat use technology to collect information aboutpatients. She and her team built a digital platform how people are taking care of their bodies.that connects data on cellphones and the hospital.The tools that are used, including smart- Her goal for the future is to do research that phones, tablets, and computers, monitor whatwill have the greatest impact on improving people eat, how much they eat, their sleeppatients lives. habits, and more. We can use that to better understand how their heart is functioning andBy Healthy Eagle staff how it will function over time, she says.James Logan Elementary School29'