Dr. Allen's academic focus mirrors her clinical interests and has been focused on longitudinal medical and neurodevelopmental outcomes in patients who have undergone the Fontan Operation and other complex congenital heart surgeries.

Dr. Allen's clinical and research focus is in the longitudinal medical, neurodevelopmental, and psychosocial care of patients with critical cardiac disease in both the inpatient and outpatient setting - primarily focused on patients with single ventricle physiology.

As a cardiac critical care attending physician in the Regenstein Cardiac Care Unit at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago, Dr. Allen's primary clinical focus is the inpatient care of patients with prolonged length of stay (including single ventricle patients and patients receiving mechanical circulatory support) and her clinical work involves collaboration with the multidisciplinary health care team including developmental specialists, cardiac rehabilitation and exercise physiologists, Child Life, case managers, social workers, and chaplains. She also coordinates Lurie Children's Comprehensive Single Ventricle Program, which is tasked with coordinating outpatient care for patients with single ventricle physiology from fetal diagnosis to the transition to adult congenital care.