UNC Anesthesiology congratulates Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology Lauriane Guichard, MD, for being awarded the prestigious Foundation for Anesthesia Education and Research (FAER) Mentored Research Training Grant (MRTG) in October 2025. This highly competitive FAER award provides $300K in research funding to selected early-career physician-scientists who have demonstrated commitment to developing research skills and launching impactful academic research careers. 
Over the two-year award period, Dr. Guichard’s team will investigate whether chronic pain, mood, and memory issues that patients experience after major surgery and critical care may represent nociplastic pain. Via a study entitled, “Predictors of nociplastic pain after cardiac surgery requiring critical care,” Dr. Guichard’s team is investigating whether these symptoms, often referred to as post-intensive care syndrome (PICS), may represent nociplastic pain. Nociplastic pain is a mechanism of pain that arises from altered sensory processing in the brain without clear tissue damage. This study is a prospective observational human study with behavioral and quantitative sensory assessments and helps to define a new pathophysiological model of post-ICU pain that has affected a growing number of patients worldwide.
UNC Anesthesiology Chair Dr. Ted Sakai noted: “Dr. Guichard’s innovative research has the potential to transform our understanding of pain after critical illness and exemplifies the excellence in academic medicine we champion at UNC Anesthesiology.”