Timothy F. Platts-Mills, MD, MSc, received his undergraduate degree from Harvard College, and his medical degree from the University of California, Los Angeles. He completed a four-year residency in emergency medicine at the University of California San Francisco-Fresno. After working full-time clinically for three years at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Dr. Platts-Mills completed a Masters of Science in Clinical Research from the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health. He is currently an assistant professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at UNC, with joint appointments in the Department of Anesthesiology, the Department of Medicine, and the Division of Geriatrics. He is the recipient of a K23 career development award from the National Institute on Aging; mentors for this award are Dr. Samuel McLean and Dr. Philip Sloane.

Dr. Platts-Mills’s career goal is to improve the quality of emergency care for older adults through research, research mentorship, and support of the larger community of geriatric emergency medicine researchers. Dr. Platts-Mills’s K23 research examines the determinants of persistent pain and functional decline after motor vehicle collision among older adults. The long-term goal of this work is to develop emergency department-initiated interventions to reduce morbidity due to persistent pain after motor vehicle collision in the elderly. A related area of research interest is improving patient education, and physician decision making regarding pharmacologic agents for the outpatient treatment of acute musculoskeletal pain in older adults. Dr. Platts-Mills’s research group is also developing a protocol to screen for elder abuse in the emergency department. Dr. Platts-Mills’s research depends upon a group of outstanding mentees, and he has received both teaching and mentoring awards for these productive collaborations. He also serves as a decision editor in geriatrics for Annals of Emergency Medicine.

Specific studies and resulting publications and presentations:
Older Adult Motor Vehicle Cohort Study
OSPREY: Observational Study of Pain Relief in the Emergency Department
The SAFE Study: Screening Assessment of Function in the Elderly