This profile is part of a series to highlight the researchers who will be honored at a ceremony on Nov. 14 for UNMC’s Scientist Laureate, Research Leadership, Distinguished Scientist and New Investigator Award recipients.
Research Leadership
The Research Leadership Award honors scientists previously recognized as Distinguished Scientists who have a longstanding research funding history and also serve as research leaders and mentors on campus.
- Name: Kaleb Michaud, PhD
- Title: Professor, Department of Internal Medicine, UNMC College of Medicine
- Joined UNMC: 2007
- Hometown: Mount Hope, Kansas
Describe your research focus in three words:
Measuring health experiences
Why is research important in the world today?
Quality research is vital for maintaining and growing our understanding of how everything works. Without constant research, we would quickly find that our prior knowledge would be inadequate to help our patients maintain and improve their health. Our world is constantly changing and what worked a decade ago may not work today – we keep ourselves ahead of this wave of change through research. Research is required for us to provide the best care.
My work will make a difference because:
We capture more of the full experience of those with these disabling conditions. While interviews and panels help us here, we are developing better questions to ask and other biomarkers that require less time of volunteers to contribute. There is more to a person than just their health conditions – and recognizing this makes for better treatments and measures, resulting in better care and better lives.
The best advice I could give a beginning researcher is:
Explore. Take breaks. Get regular literature updates, and don’t be afraid to follow rabbit holes, just give yourself reasonable limits on time spent working without an outcome (for example a paper, grant or new method). Have multiple mentors, internally and externally, and meet regularly – don’t take them for granted and don’t let them do the same.
The toughest lesson I’ve learned is:
I cannot do everything that I want. Life is about choices and to enjoy the boons and busts from those choices. It always is greener somewhere else; there always is someone smarter or stronger, but being an outlier on the curve has tremendous consequences on other aspects of your well-being.
The best part of my job is:
Working with talented people who are committed to learning, teaching and improving the lives of others
Three things you may not know about me are:
- I appear in three documentaries unrelated to my current research or board game hobby:
- “Echoes from the Ancients” (1998) about my summer in 1996 as part of an archaeological dig in the northern Galilee in Israel.
- “The Computer Chronicles” (1999) about Magic the Gathering moving onto computer screens.
- “Rabbit Fever” (2006) about kids raising rabbits for show and competing for “rabbit royalty.” I was interviewed for six hours and appeared for about 10 minutes in the original two-hour director’s cut.
- I have a large board game collection.
- I have been a Chiefs fan since I was 10.
Congratulations, Kaleb!
U da’ man, Kaleb. Keep up the great work – UNMC is lucky to have you.
I am so lucky to have you in my orbit! Thanks for all you do, Kaleb!
We can never hear enough about the “best advice” and “toughest lessons”–so valuable! Congratulations, Kaleb–a job well done and a life well lived!
Congratulations, Kaleb!