Stephani L. Stancil, PhD, APRN
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine; Research Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, University of Kansas School of Medicine
Full Biography
As Children’s Mercy Research Institute (CMRI) grows its research programs, the institute has welcomed many innovative, early-career investigators to its roster of researchers. These investigators bring their novel ideas, unique talents, and diverse interests to CMRI. The following profile is one in our series on emerging principal investigators.
Stephani Stancil, PhD, APRN, Adolescent Medicine and Clinical Pharmacology, is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City (UMKC) School of Medicine and Research Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Kansas Medical Center (KUMC). She has always had an interest in how different chemicals work and can be used to make different products — from soaps to medications. “When I was a kid, I used to enjoy reading things like the ingredient list on shampoos bottles to figure out what each component did,” she said. “Naturally, this evolved into a passion for pharmacology.”
Before becoming a clinician scientist, Dr. Stancil worked as an advanced practice registered nurse in adolescent medicine. While working with teens, she encountered the limitations of medication selection to treat mental health disorders. “We are limited in knowing whether a specific medicine will work or not. It’s really the flip of a coin for things like depression and anxiety. This can lead to delays in improvement and prolonged disability for teens and their families,” she said. Her clinical work further ignited her love of pharmacology and the emerging field of precision therapeutics. She then went on to obtain a PhD in pharmacology and pharmaceutical science and complete a post-doctoral fellowship in pediatric clinical pharmacology at Children’s Mercy Kansas City (CMKC).
When Dr. Stancil considered post-doctoral fellowships after obtaining her PhD, she chose Children’s Mercy. “The pediatric clinical pharmacology fellowship at Children’s Mercy is arguably one of the best in the country. It was huge to be able to train with leaders in the field like Steve Leeder and to learn from the best,” she said.
Building on her interests in precision therapeutics for mental health conditions, Dr. Stancil is researching the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to detect brain response in teens to medication in her study, “Development of a Pharmacodynamic Biomarker of Opioid Antagonism in Adolescents with Eating Disorders.” She received a K23 award from the National Institute of Mental Health and had previously received a KL2 Career Development Program award from Frontiers Clinical and Translational Science Institute at the University of Kansas. For this project, her mentors include: William Brooks, PhD (KUMC), Laura Martin, PhD (KUMC), Ann Davis, PhD, MPH (CMKC), Jeffrey Strawn, MD (University of Cincinnati), Susan Abdel-Rahman, PharmD, and the following co-investigators: Hung-Wen Yeh, PhD, MS (CMKC); J. Steven Leeder, PharmD, PhD (CMKC); Michaela M. Voss, MD (CMKC); and James Bartolotti, PhD (KUMC).
Dr. Stancil said, “The main goal is to develop tools that objectively detect response in the brain for medications that are used to treat eating disorders, anxiety, and depression. Right now, we don't have great objective tools to know whether medications are working, particularly in kids. We hope to use fMRI to detect drug response in real time.” If her current work demonstrates that fMRI detects drug responses, Dr. Stancil would then like to pursue future studies that look at the correlation between fMRI data and clinical outcomes.
Dr. Stancil is also a co-Primary-Investigator with Dr. Leeder on a project to study the use of magnetic resonance spectroscopy to detect concentrations of medicines like fluoxetine (Prozac®) in the brain. The project, in collaboration with colleagues at KUMC, studies the relationship between how much medicine gets into the brain and how much is available in the body. It will also look at some genetic variations that may impact that relationship. Her team is now working to expand the use of this neuroimaging method to detect other medications in the brain and support safe, effective use in children.
Dr. Stancil is also working on a project with Abbey Masonbrink, MD, Pediatric Hospital Medicine, to develop personalized vaping cessation treatment in hospitalized youth. Studies in adults suggest that differences in genetics and metabolism influence the likelihood of success in quitting cigarettes with medication versus nicotine replacement options like the nicotine patch. Dr. Stancil and Dr. Masonbrink are in the process of securing funding for a study to understand if this holds true in youth, particularly in youth who vape.
As Dr. Stancil works with teens and young adult research participants, she strives to make the experience positive for them. “I want them to feel valued and that their contribution of time and body is meaningful.” Her team not only sends thank you cards and birthday cards to research participants, but they have also developed a Teen Research Advisors program to give teens an opportunity to contribute to the future of research. Teens who have participated in one of Dr. Stancil’s research studies can be part of the program that includes monthly discussion boards, quarterly in-person huddles, lab experiences, and career development opportunities like shadowing. Dr. Stancil is in the process of getting funding to expand the program.
In addition to her research in precision therapeutics, Dr. Stancil’s interests include community health for youth experiencing homelessness and reproductive and sexual health. She was recently honored by local nonprofit Synergy Services for her work with Children’s Mercy Teen Clinic on Synergy’s youth campus. The clinic provides a medical home for youth experiencing homelessness.