Karlyn A. Edwards, PhD, University of New Mexico

Karlyn (Karly) A. Edwards graduated from the University of Puget Sound in 2014 with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology. Following this, Karly was employed as a case manager at a non-profit mental health agency in Tacoma, WA, where she worked with patients with a wide array of serious mental health conditions in outpatient, residential, and acute inpatient treatment settings. While there, she was a member of the Intensive Services Team, which aimed to effectively triage and treat complex psychiatric patients. Next, she was employed as a research assistant in the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine at the University of Washington where she assisted with multiple NIH-funded research grants. These projects examined the efficacy of mindfulness, neurofeedback training, cognitive behavioral therapy, and hypnosis among patients with chronic pain, spinal cord injury, Multiple Sclerosis, Muscular Dystrophy, and other chronic health conditions.

Karly entered the Clinical Psychology Ph.D. program at the University of New Mexico in 2016. Her primary research interests include the treatment of chronic pain and other chronic health conditions, the impact of chronic pain among patients maintained on medications for opioid use disorder, and the treatment of comorbid chronic pain and substance use. She is also interested in psychosocial factors that may impact successful rehabilitation among patients with chronic health conditions.

Karly is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Systems Neuroscience and Pain Lab at Stanford University.