SUMMARY
Felicity T. Enders, Ph.D., is a highly accomplished collaborative biostatistician. She has more than 180 publications with an h-index of over 60 and an i100-index of over 25. Dr. Enders has partnered with researchers in clinical areas across the translational science spectrum, and her work has been cited over 19,000 times.
Dr. Enders' research has focused on educating researchers in biostatistics. For about 15 years, this took the form of statistics education. Leveraging her award-winning expertise, Dr. Enders developed a national statistics education research team within the Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Research Design Special Interest Group of the Association for Clinical and Translational Science. Her research interests have now evolved into studies of population health and the research workforce.
Focus areas
- Hidden curriculum for research. Hidden curriculum refers to the unwritten institutional norms and expectations that investigators often are assumed to know but are not explicitly taught. Dr. Enders has demonstrated that hidden curriculum acts as a barrier across the research career trajectory, from training to entry into leadership. Furthermore, she found that hidden curriculum presents even greater challenges for trainees and junior faculty with backgrounds that differ from those of the majority at the institution. Teaching the hidden curriculum benefits everyone and is especially helpful for those from different backgrounds. Additionally, Dr. Enders has highlighted the importance of training mentors in hidden curriculum.
- Health outcome and population engineering (HOPE). Dr. Enders' recent research focuses on a new framework she developed for HOPE. People may be exposed to chronic stress, which can lead to accelerated biological aging and early morbidity and mortality. With HOPE, Dr. Enders plans to proactively identify people at risk of accelerated aging with the goal of intervening to improve health outcomes. The screening can be done through a brief survey assessing lifetime stress or using geocoded home address data. As no suitable survey currently exists, Dr. Enders has developed one and is in the process of testing it.
- Population-conscious analysis. Social demographics are frequently used as predictor variables in scientific models. However, these variables are not biological and frequently act as proxies for other variables. Dr. Enders has proposed a new statistical approach, population-conscious analysis, to evaluate social demographic variables while not including them as a priori predictor variables. In tandem with this, Dr. Enders has developed a set of alternative predictor variables to consider based on the type of data collected in a study.
- Biostatistics education. Dr. Enders' research includes statistics education for nonstatisticians. Her most recent efforts involve establishing national competencies through the Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Research Design Special Interest Group of the Association for Clinical and Translational Science.
Significance to patient care
Dr. Enders works to transform patient care. She develops scoring and scoping systems that help healthcare professionals assess health conditions more easily and identify medicines that may pose risks to patients.
Professional highlights
- Association for Clinical and Translational Science:
- President-elect, 2025-present.
- Member, board of directors, 2020-present.
- Mayo Clinic:
- Associate dean, Academic Affairs, Mayo Clinic Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, 2025-present.
- Associate director, Center for Clinical and Translational Science, 2023-present.
- Director, Education Resources, Center for Clinical and Translational Science, 2023-present.
- Deputy director for belonging, Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center, 2022-present.
- Director, Office of Belonging, 2022-present.
- Dean's Recognition Award, Mayo Clinic Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, 2025.
- Program director, Clinical and Translational Science Track, Ph.D. Program, Mayo Clinic Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, 2022-2025.
- Educator of the Year Award, Center for Clinical and Translational Science, 2013.
- American Statistical Association:
- Elected fellow, 2020-present.
- Distinguished Achievement Award, Section for the Teaching of Statistics in the Health Sciences, 2021.
- Publication Award, for the paper "The Hidden Curriculum in Health Care Academia," Association for Clinical and Translational Science, 2023.
- Fellow, Hedwig van Ameringen Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine, Drexel University, 2022-2023.
- American College of Gastroenterology:
- Presidential Poster Award, 2010, 2013 and 2015.
- Author, President's Plenary Session, 2011.
- Biomedical Statistics and Informatics Meritorious Award, Department of Health Sciences Research, Mayo Clinic, 2012-2013.