Dr. Sara Shaunfield received a PhD in Communication from the University of Kentucky. After which, she joined the Department of Medical Social Sciences in the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University in 2015. Dr. Shaunfield serves as Lead Qualitative Scientist and core member of the Northwestern University Center on Outcomes Research and Education (NUCORE) where she oversees and conducts qualitative scale development and content validation studies of illness-specific patient-reported outcome measures, symptom indices, patient preference questionnaires, and measures of health-realted quality of life.

Dr. Shaunfield's research focuses on patient and family caregiver outcomes and quality of life, including patient-reported outcome measure development and validation. She is especially interested in explorations of the influence of interpersonal communication on informal family caregiver burden and health outcomes within the contexts of chronic, palliative, and end-of-life care. Dr. Shaunfield has over 11 years experience using qualitative research methods. Her work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, Critical Path Institute, National Heart Lung and Blood Institute, and Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.