Stephanie Fitzpatrick, PhD

Dr. Stephanie L. Fitzpatrick is a clinical health psychologist whose research centers on embedding behavioral interventions for obesity and chronic disease management in primary care practices. She has expertise in development, implementation, and analysis of behavioral interventions including use of advanced statistical modeling such as structural equation modeling and item response theory. Dr. Fitzpatrick is currently the principal investigator on a NIDDK-funded R21 that involves applying latent class analysis to PREMIER and Weight Loss Maintenance trial data to identify individuals who successfully maintained health behavior changes over a year or more and establish demographic and baseline psychosocial predictors of behavior change maintenance. Before joining the Center for Health Research, Dr. Fitzpatrick was an assistant professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine at Rush University Medical Center. There, she served as both a clinical researcher and as a behavioral psychologist in a multidisciplinary clinic specializing in weight, diabetes, and hypertension management. Dr. Fitzpatrick earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of Rochester, and her PhD in clinical psychology with a specialization in health psychology from the University of Miami. She also completed a one-year health psychology internship at Rush University Medical Center, Department of Behavioral Sciences and a two-year postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of General Internal Medicine at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.