Nik Koscielniak, MS, MPH, PhD

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Nik Koscielniak graduated in 2020 with a PhD in Health Infrastructures and Learning Systems. His dissertation was entitled, "A Learning Health Sciences Approach to Understanding Clinical Documentation in Pediatric Rehabilitation Settings."

He has a background in public health and occupational therapy. Prior to beginning the HILS PhD program, he worked as an occupational therapist in acute care at the University of Michigan University Hospital. He completed his master of public health and master of science in occupational therapy from Washington University in St. Louis (WUSTL), where he also worked as a research assistant at the WUSTL Prevention Research Center. He received his undergraduate degree in anthropology from the University of Missouri with an emphasis in human evolution and primate anatomy; he is also an alum of the Chick Evans Caddie Scholarship program.

Nik's dissertation is entitled A Learning Health Sciences Approach to Understanding Clinical Documentation in Pediatric Rehabilitation Settings. He is currently a Program Officer at Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) in Washington, DC.

What would you tell potential students about the program? The HILS program provided me an opportunity to explore uncharted areas of LHS science, but also build a foundation for the next steps in my academic research career. It was amazing to see how the HILS program evolved over my time. The program and department strived to build both the science of LHS and the program infrastructure by expanding the dimensions of knowledge and research opportunities around LHS.