Grace Juan Soma

Grace Juan Soma is a PhD Student in Implementation Science in the Department of Global Health at the University of Washington. Grace is a medical doctor from South Sudan, trained in Kenya where she received her medical degree (MBCHB) and Master of Medicine (MMED) in Pediatrics and Child Health from the University of Nairobi, Kenya. Additionally, she holds an MSc in Tropical Pediatrics from the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM), Liverpool, UK. Grace has 10+ years cumulative work experience in East Africa (South Sudan and Kenya), providing specialized clinical pediatric care, medical education, training diverse cadres of healthcare workers, and in conducting healthcare research with the South Sudan Medical Journal (SSMJ). Most recently, Grace is participated in a NIH – Fogarty Global Health fellowship as a postdoctoral research associate fellow under the ACHIEVE consortium at the International Center for Child and Adolescent Health (ICHAD) located at the Brown School, Washington University in St Louis, Missouri. Her research interests center on pediatric HIV with a focus on pediatric HIV testing services (HTS) and the barriers to quality of care for children living with HIV (CLHIV) in SSA. She is keen on researching poor pediatric HIV test uptake and identifying and translating into practice, evidence based innovative approaches to pediatric HTS such as use of novel saliva-based HIV tests, clinical algorithms, risk screening tools, and digital/ mobile based applications, including the use of artificial intelligence (AI) to improve test acceptance.