Saun-Joo Yoon, PhD, RN

TEACHING

Dr. Yoon teaches both clinical and didactic nursing courses for undergraduate and accelerated BSN students. In addition, Dr. Yoon mentors and supervises Honors students, McNair Scholars, and doctoral students (both PhD and DNP).

RESEARCH/SCHOLARSHIP

Dr. Yoon’s research areas are under the umbrella of palliative care, oncology, symptom management, and complementary therapies. Dr. Yoon focuses on symptom management of adult cancer populations, with particular interest in managing symptoms and/or symptom clusters using complementary therapies as the interventions to improve patient outcomes and quality of life after treatment. She is currently conducting a pilot study (randomized controlled trial) to investigate the effect of acupuncture on managing cancer-related anorexia and cachexia in patients with GI cancer. The study has been funded by the UF Opportunity Seed Fund and partially supported by the Clinical Translational Science Institute (CTSI). Another ongoing study is examining the Progression of Weight Loss in Patients with Gastrointestinal Cancer with the existing data obtained via i2b2. She completed studies on the use of dietary supplements to manage chronic pain, the effectiveness of CAM for chronic GI symptom management, and a feasibility study to improve appetite and slow weight loss among adults with cancers of the GI tract. Other areas of interest include symptom management of chronic conditions such as sickle cell disease, irritable bowel syndrome and ovarian cancer.

SERVICE/PRACTICE

Dr. Yoon is a member of the Academic Affairs Committee (AAC) and the Nursing Formal Review Committee (NFRC). She is a member of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), Oncology Nursing Society (ONS), Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society (STTI), Southern Nursing Research Society (SNRS), American Nurses Association/ Florida Nurses Association (ANA/FNA) and UF Health Cancer Center (UFHCC). She has been the recipient of many honors, most recently the UFHCC Celebration of Excellence Award (Bench to Bedside Award) and the UF Research Foundation (UFRF) Professorship Award. Since 2004, she has been serving as a reviewer for various journals.

Research interests include 1) interventions with use of complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) modalities to improve nutritional status, cancer-cachexia and symptom management in adult patients with gastrointestinal cancers, 2) herbal supplement use to manage symptoms and health promotion in older adults, and 3) palliative care related to cancer-cachexia in patients with GI cancers.