Faculty Profiles

Ny'Nika T. McFadden earned her PhD in Health Education and Promotion and MA in Communication Studies from The University of Alabama. She received her BS in Psychology from Troy University.

Dr. McFadden is currently an Assistant Professor of Public Health in the Department of Health and Human Performance and a Faculty Fellow with the Translational Health Research Center at Texas State University. Additionally, Dr. McFadden is a Patient Experience Fellow with the Journal of Patient Experience. She is a public health and health communication scholar who has an interest in diabetes prevention, diabetes management, game-based learning, patient education, patient engagement, patient-provider communication, and diabetes technology. Her research seeks to primarily provide support for individuals living with Prediabetes, LADA (Latent Autoimmune Diabetes in Adults), Type 1 Diabetes, Type 2 Diabetes, and Gestational Diabetes. Dr. McFadden’s research focuses on exploring healthcare service delivery experiences related to transition of care and care coordination from pediatric to adult care, hospital admission, post discharge, and receiving care from multiple specialists. Also, her research focuses on supporting the diabetes community by increasing their self-efficacy communicating independently with providers and creating digital health interventions and other forms of patient education materials to improve their transition of care and care coordination experiences and their disease and symptom management behaviors related to hypoglycemia and hyperglycemia episodes, medical device and mobile application support, nutrition, physical activity, and diabetes distress.

Dr. McFadden has accumulated external and internal funding totaling $100,000 as PI from funders such as Beyond Type 1, MATTER, Texas State University's Division of Research, and Texas State University's Office of Innovation, Commercialization, and Engagement. Funding has been used to support her research related to hypoglycemia problem-solving skills, perceptions of glycemic management using diabetes technology, and development of a transition of care and care coordination digital platform for underserved populations living with diabetes.

She has published in journals such as the American Journal of Health Education, American Journal of Health Promotion, Diabetes Care, Patient Education and Counseling, and The Science of Diabetes Self-Management and Care. Additionally, she has presented at state, national, and international conferences such as the American Academy of Health Behavior (AAHB), Association of Diabetes Care and Education Specialists (ADCES), American Public Health Association (APHA), Behavioral Research in Diabetes Group Exchange (BRIDGE), Emirates Diabetes & Endocrine Congress (EDEC), International Shared Decision Making (ISDM), International Society for Pediatric and Adolescent Diabetes (ISPAD), Kentucky Conference on Health Communication (KCHC), National Communication Association (NCA), National Institutes of Health (NIH) – National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK): Network of Minority Health Research Investigators (NMRI), Society for Public Health Education (SOPHE), and the Texas Society for Public Health Education (TSOPHE).