Fridman, Advocate for Health Communication, Aims to Empower Patients Through Digital Interventions
Ilona Fridman, Ph.D, has seen first-hand the struggle patients often go through in getting the correct information after they get a frightening diagnosis. The passion to empower patients with proper knowledge so they can map out their health journey is at the heart of the newly-established Advanced Communication and Decision-Making Center Lab at the Hackensack Meridian Center for Discovery and Innovation (CDI). Up and running since July, the lab is already making tremendous strides in providing research on how providers can build better relationships with and give comfort to their patients through effective communication.
Dr. Fridman believes health outcomes are driven by knowledge and informed decisions about diseases, treatments, and cures. Communication with patients is key to optimize all aspects of this equation.
Dr. Fridman, an expert facilitator in health communication, is dedicated to enhancing patient outcomes by harnessing emerging technologies and designing innovative interventions for health communication and decision-making.
“Dr. Fridman is a terrific complement to the outreach and cancer prevention strategies growing at the CDI,” said David Perlin, Ph.D., chief scientific officer and executive vice president, of the CDI.
“Her work fits in well with other world-class researchers at the Cancer Prevention Precision Control Institute (CPPCI),” added Lisa Carter-Bawa, Ph.D., MPH, APRN, ANP-C, FAAN, from the Hackensack Meridian Center for Discovery and Innovation (CDI), director of the CPPCI and professor of medicine at the Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine
Path To Health Communication and Medicine
Dr. Fridman traces her passion for communication and decision-making back to her early career in Russia.
After earning her undergraduate degree, she worked in a multinational corporation, where she designed effective communication strategies for clients and partners. This experience deepened her appreciation for the power of information.
Later, as a co-leader of a start-up developing digital decision support tools, she explored how communication impacts decision-making.
"Teaching managers to discuss product pros and cons with client preferences showed me the benefits of informed choices for long-lasting relationships," she explains, highlighting the improved client satisfaction and strong partnerships that followed.
Dr. Fridman’s journey has shaped her focus on how individuals evaluate information and what they consider worth acting upon.
After immigrating to the U.S., Dr. Fridman’s experience and knowledge about decision making helped her to secure a full scholarship for a Ph.D. at Columbia University. While studying management with a focus on the psychology of decision-making, she started working with a Palliative Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC). This encounter was transformative, as she learned how uninformed decisions in cancer care can profoundly impact lives.
During her time at MSKCC as a graduate student, Fridman tackled the issue of overtreatment in patients with advanced cancer.
Dr. Fridman honed her expertise in health communication and decision making during her postdoctoral training at the Duke Margolis Center for Health Policy, where she established strong collaboration with data scientists incorporating insights of natural language processing in her work. Due to her cross-knowledge of data science and health communication, she was invited to co-lead a Capstone Project for a cohort of graduate students in Master of Interdisciplinary Data Science.
“My health communication expertise was extremely useful for helping graduate students, strong experts in the area of data analysis, to communicate their ideas and results to faculty and industry partners,” said Dr. Fridman.
During the COVID-19 lockdown, Dr. Fridman secured a T32 fellowship in the University of North Carolina’s Cancer Care Quality Training in Cancer Outcomes Program.
Working in close collaboration with providers and patients once again, she again found strong evidence that uninformed decisions in cancer care profoundly impact human life.
Bringing Communication Expertise To CDI
Since then, she and her teams have spent a significant amount of time studying the volume and availability of credible versus non-credible health information on the internet and social media.
This research ultimately paved the way for a position at the CDI. As she planned and secured National Cancer Institute (NCI) funding to support patient-centered intervention for conversation about misinformation with patients affected by cancer. This intervention will be a strong support for informed decision making in an era of social media and the web, she says.
The CDI has been a great fit for her research on communication, she said. The CPPCI aims to be a transformational translational research Institute that connects science to practice with a tripartite mission focused on reducing disparities, improving patient outcomes through improved patient-clinician communication leveraging novel digital and social media outreach tools, and community-engaged participatory research methods.
“The CDI is a great place to collaborate and find like minded people. I see a fire in peoples’ eyes here when they talk about their own research and projects,” she added. “Additionally, having so much support from the staff and leadership feels very inspiring.”
The Fridman Lab at CDI
Now part of the team at CDI, Dr. Fridman is thrilled to expand her lab, hire new staff, and write grants. She’s passionate about spreading the message that researchers and health care providers have both the power and responsibility to communicate effectively with patients and communities to maintain trust and support individual decisions that align with both personal preferences and scientific evidence.
“When these relationships are stable, patients can get the best care and care outcome. Patients need to understand how to digest all the complex health information that is publicly available today, especially as it relates to cancer,” said Dr. Fridman. “I am inspired by the patients becoming more and more self educated on their health journeys. But we need to limit how much they’re exposed to misinformation. Providers can be a great source to help patients understand what they’re reading and point them toward the right sources.”
The wife and mother describes herself as a foodie - something she shares in common with staff in her lab - and a lover of travel. She is excited to continue her own professional journey at the CDI for years to come.