Rinad Beidas
Rinad S. Beidas (January 1, 1982) is an American clinical child psychologist and implementation scientist. She is a professor of Psychiatry and Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania; Director of the Penn Implementation Science Center (PISCE@LDI); and Director of the Penn Medicine Nudge Unit. Early life and education. Beidas was born on January 1, 1982, in Amman, Jordan. She earned her Bachelor of Arts degree from Colgate University in 2003 and her Master's degree and PhD from Temple University. While completing her doctoral degree, she received the  2008 Assembly of Scientist/Practitioner Psychologists award. She also worked under the guidance of Philip C. Kendall at his Child and Adolescent Anxiety Disorders Clinic, wherein she treated children with anxiety using a cognitive-behavioral approach. Career. Upon completing her PhD, Beidas joined the faculty at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in 2012. In her early years at the school, one of her family members died by suicide using a firearm. This led her to research firearm safety evidence-based practices and study firearm safety in pediatric primary care. In her role as an assistant  professor of psychiatry, Beidas lead a study titled "A Hybrid Effectiveness-Implementation Trial of an Evidence-Based Exercise Intervention for Breast Cancer Survivors" which aimed at finding barriers to implementation of the evidence-based exercise and education program for breast cancer survivors. The following year, she was the recipient of the 2015 President's New Researcher Award of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies. In 2017, Beidas was the senior author on the longest known study looking at suicidal ideation following cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) treatment in youth. The results of the study found that patients who did not  respond to CBT in their childhood as a treatment for anxiety were more likely to endure suicidal thoughts seven to 19 years after treatment. She also received funding from the National Institute of Mental Health for her project to encourage therapists to use evidence-based practices more often in their sessions. In 2020, Beidas was the principal investigator of a National Institute of Mental Health funded research project aimed at improving the implementation of an evidence-based firearm safety program.