Welcome Laura Scoville, Research Assistant, to the Division of Geriatrics!

Please join us in welcoming Laura Scoville, MSc, Research Assistant, to our Division of Geriatrics!

Laura started this morning and will work with Dr. Theresa Allison, Morgan Nguyen, and Livia Umeda to support the Music and Dementia Research Lab.  Laura graduated from Truman State University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Anthropology/Sociology with a Biology minor.  She earned her Master of Science degree with Distinction in Human Osteoarcheology from the University of Edinburgh.

In her most recent graduate research at The University of Edinburgh, her thesis, “Non-Destructive Visualization of Internal Dental Morphology: Analyzing the Efficacy of MicroCT on Microstructural Analysis of Human Dentition,” she assessed over 100 sets of human skeletal remains and learned the operating techniques of micro-CT scan set-up and scan reconstruction. The crux of her research involved traveling to and meeting with elderly participants in their homes to gain a greater understanding of their lifestyles and opinions.  Prior to this research experience, Laura was a Research Intern at the University of Missouri-Columbia where she initiated a pilot study. During her undergraduate studies, she conducted an independent ethnographic research project where she documented the lives of elderly individuals.

Moreover, one of Laura’s personal passions is music. She learned how to play steel-pan drums and worked as a DJ at the University of Missouri. Also, Laura was trained as a violinist for five years and learned how to read music plus the basics of music theory.

As a Research Assistant, Laura will help coordinate research protocols, data collection, and operations of various clinical research studies. She will also be conducting many in-home observational studies with older adults who are newly diagnosed with dementia. Laura will be onsite at the VA campus on Mondays and Wednesdays. She can be reached at [email protected] if you need to reach her. We are so excited that she has joined our growing Division.  Please help us welcome her to the team!  😊