Overview
My research has broadly focused on pain and symptom management in children, adolescents, and young adults with sickle cell disease. Previous NIH-funded projects were the first to describe the patterns of daily pain managed at home in school-aged children and adolescents, and risks factors for increased pain frequency in these age-groups. Subsequent longitudinal studies examined the onset and frequency of pain in infants and young children as reported by their parents. To gain further insights into the consequences of pain in this population, I conducted a multi-site cross-sectional study of health-related quality of life initially in adults, and then later in pediatric age-groups. This lead to my participation in the NIH-funded PROMIS® (Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System) network which supported my validation of the initial pediatric measures in children and adolescents with sickle cell disease, and the development and validation of pediatric pain intensity, pain quality, and pain behavior measures.
More recently, my involvement with the Analgesic, Anesthetic, and Addiction Clinical Trial Translations, Innovations, Opportunities, and Networks (ACTTION), an FDA public-private partnership, and with the American Pain Society (APS) and the American Academy of Pain Medicine (AAPM), lead to my participation in working groups that developed evidence-based and multidimensional approaches to classifying acute and chronic pain conditions. I served as the co-chair for the sickle cell pain-working group that was tasked with identifying the diagnostic criteria specific for chronic sickle cell pain, and as a member of a similar working group that developed a related taxonomy for acute sickle cell pain. Evidence gaps that we identified during this process, particularly the frequent occurrence of acute pain in adolescents and adults with sickle cell disease and long-standing chronic pain, have become the focus of my current clinical research interests.
Building on my clinical experience in sickle cell disease management, certification in clinical trial management, and expertise in patient-reported outcomes (PROs), with funding from industry, foundation, and the NIH, I have become a leading pediatric sickle cell clinical trial investigator, having been a local site principal or co-investigator for over 25 multisite sickle cell disease clinical trials and observational studies, and the lead investigator on 2 multisite clinical trials.
Morris CR, Brown, LA, Reynolds M, Dampier C, Lane P, Watt A, Kumari P, Harris F, Manoranjithan S, Mendis RD, Figueroa J, and Shiva S. Impact of Arginine Therapy on Mitochondrial Function in Children with Sickle Cell Disease during Vaso-occlusive Pain. 2020 Accepted Blood.
Mara CA, Kashikar-Zuck S, Cunningham N, Goldschneider KR, Huang B, Dampier C, Sherry DD, Crosby L, Farrell J, Barnett K, and Morgan EM. Development and Psychometric Evaluation of the PROMIS Pediatric Pain Intensity Scale. 2020 Accepted J Pain.
Sil S, Cohen LL, Bakshi N, Watt A, Barnett M, Abudulai F, Dampier C. Changes in Pain and Psychosocial Functioning and Transition to Chronic Pain in Pediatric Sickle Cell Disease. Clin J Pain. 2020 Apr 13. doi: 10.1097/AJP.0000000000000827.
Sil S, Lai K, Lee J, Marchak J, Thompson B, Cohen LL, Lane P, Dampier C. Preliminary Evaluation of the Clinical Implementation of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Chronic Pain Management in Pediatric Sickle Cell Disease. Complementary Therapies in Medicine. Mar;49:102348. doi: 10.1016/j.ctim.2020.102348. Epub 2020 Feb 15.
Field JJ, Ballas SK, Campbell CM, Crosby LE, Dampier C, Darbari DS, McClish DK, Smith WR, Zempsky WT. AAAPT Diagnostic Criteria for Acute Sickle Cell Disease Pain. J Pain. 2019 Jul;20(7):746-759. doi: 10.1016/j.jpain.2018.12.003.
Carden MA, Brousseau DC, Ahmad FA, Bennett J, Bhatt S, Bogie A, Brown K, Casper TC, Chapman LL, Chumpitazi CE, Cohen D, Dampier C, Ellison AM, Grasemann H, Hickey RW, Hsu LL, Leibovich S, Powell E, Richards R, Sarnaik S, Weiner DL, and Morris CR on behalf of the Sickle Cell Disease Arginine Study Group and the Pediatric Emergency Care Applied Research Network (PECARN). Normal Saline Bolus Use is Associated with Worse Pain Outcomes in Children with Sickle Cell Anemia and Vaso-occlusive Pain. Am J Hematol. 2019 Jun;94(6):689-696.
Kanter J, Heath LE, Knorr J, Agbenyega ET, Colombatti R, Dampier C, Hassab H, Manwani D, Robitaille N, Brown PB, Jakubowski JA, Yao S, Hoppe C. Novel findings from The Multinational DOVE study on geographic and age-related differences in pain perception and analgesic usage in children with sickle cell anaemia. Br J Haematol. 2019 Mar;184(6): 1058-1061 doi: 10.1111/bjh.15250.
Sil S, Cohen LL, Dampier C. Pediatric Pain Screening Identifies Youth at Risk of Chronic Pain in Sickle Cell Disease. Pediatr Blood Cancer. 2019 Mar;66(3):e27538
Dampier C. New and Emerging Treatments for Vaso-Occlusive Pain in Sickle Cell Disease. Expert Rev Hematol. 2019 Oct;12(10):857-872. doi: 10.1080/17474086.2019.1649131.
Dampier C, Palermo TM, Darbari DS, Hassell K, Smith W, Zempsky W. AAPT Diagnostic Criteria for Chronic Sickle Cell Disease Pain. J Pain. 2017 May;18(5) 490-498 doi: 10.1016/j.jpain.2016.12.016
NCATS/NIH - UL1TR002378
Georgia Clinical and Translational Science Alliance
Role: Program Director, Regulatory Knowledge, and Support Component
PI: Taylor
NICHD/NIH - 1R01HD086978
iCanCope with Sickle Cell Disease
Role: MPI
NHLBI/NIH - 1R34HL122557
Arginine Therapy for the Treatment of Pain in Children with Sickle Cell Disease
Role: Co-Investigator
PI: Morris
FDA/NIH - R01FD004814
Phase 2 Study of L-Arginine Therapy for the Treatment of Pediatric Sickle Cell Disease Pain
Role: Co-Investigator
PI: Morris
- Health-related quality of life in children, adolescents, and adults with sickle cell disease
- Development and testing of psychometrically sound measures providing self-report of symptoms, particularly pain and fatigue, from children, adolescents, and young adults with sickle cell disease
- Characteristics of acute pain in children and adolescents with chronic sickle cell pain
- Risk factors for the development of chronic pain in adolescents with sickle cell disease