Vital Signs 2019

Nursing an epidemic

Faculty address comorbidities of opioid use

Alumni influencers

Meet the winners of our 2019 Alumni Awards

Nursing bootcamp

New BSN students get lessons in success

FALL 2019

The M. Christine Schwartz Lab catapults UIC into the future of nursing education

ALL IT TAKES IS A SINGLE

Join the UIC College of Nursing as we blaze a trail toward our most ambitious fundraising goal in history, all to support students, increase resources for faculty and improve facilities.

Small and large gifts to any of these funds move us closer to our $33 million goal.

• UIC COLLEGE OF NURSING SCHOLARSHIP FUND • UIC COLLEGE OF NURSING REGIONAL SCHOLARSHIP FUND • UIC COLLEGE OF NURSING ANNUAL FUND • DEAN’S FACULTY CATALYST FUND

Give today at go.uic.edu/IgniteUICNursing.

Volume 34

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FALL 2019

DEPARTMENTS

FEATURES

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2 Message from the dean 3 Notepad College of Nursing news 22 Focus on Education Welcome to nursing bootcamp

Faculty you might not expect (page 33)

Hope for heart patients (page 31)

11 Support on every 9 avenue Associate prof Valerie Gruss is on a mission to meet the needs of a rapidly aging population.

14 Alumni Influencers Meet our Distinguished Alumni Award winner and Outstanding Alumni Achievement Award winners.

16 Nursing an epidemic Nursing faculty and students are bringing healthcare to injection drug users at a busy needle-exchange site.

20 Speaking up Springfield pinning speaker Elijah Hernandez faced an autism diagnosis and homelessness on his way to becoming a nurse.

23 The future of nursing education Step into the $6.1 million Schwartz Lab, featuring the latest in simulation and experiential technology.

27 I Impact Donors and students achieve goals through philanthropy 30 Student Spotlight Students bring home first-place finishes 31 Expert Viewpoint Susan Dunn on hopelessness in heart patients 32 Research Round-up Highlights from UIC nurse scientists 35 Around the State Updates from UIC Nursing Campuses in Peoria, Quad Cities, Rockford, Springfield and Urbana 40 LookingBack Old-school simulation

DEAN Terri E. Weaver, PhD, RN, FAAN, ATSF CHIEF EDITOR Liz Miller

On the cover: Students Charitee Rummage and Saviour Karlo work with instructor Karyn Roberts, MSN, RN, in the college’s new Schwartz Lab (see p. 23)

UIC COLLEGE OF NURSING OFFICE OF ADVANCEMENT Steven A. George, Assistant Dean Liz Miller, Director, Marketing and Public Affairs

MANAGING EDITOR & WRITER Deborah Ziff Soriano

Sara Almassian, Associate Director, Alumni Engagement and Participation

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Jonathan Samples, Liz Miller

Gina Mancari, Advancement Coordinator

GRAPHIC DESIGNER Joanne Chappell PHOTOGRAPHERS Mark Mershon, Jonathan Samples

Matthew Campion, Associate Director, Development Joanne Chappell, Graphic Designer Mark Mershon, Multimedia Associate Jonathan Samples, Digital Communications Strategist Deborah Ziff Soriano, Editorial Writer

Vital Signs is published for the alumni, faculty, students and friends of the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Nursing. Š 2019 Your comments are welcomed: University of Illinois at Chicago College of Nursing (MC 802) 845 S. Damen Ave. Chicago, IL 60612 Phone: (312) 996-1454 Email: lhmiller@uic.edu Web: nursing.uic.edu Facebook: UIC.CON Twitter: @uicnursing Instagram: uicnursing

DEAN’S MESSAGE

I love the energy in the air at the beginning of each academic year: the buzz of students and faculty greeting each other again; the hopeful anticipation of new academic and clinical experiences; and the heightened sense of possibility as each student embarks on the next step toward fulfilling a goal that is both personal and professional.

This fall, that excitement reached a new level as students at our main campus in Chicago stepped for the first time into the M. Christine Schwartz Experiential Learning & Simulation Laboratory, a 15,000-square-foot hub of teaching and learning.

There’s an initial “wow factor” when you enter the Schwartz Lab and take in the aesthetics, but more importantly, I was thrilled to see students and faculty quickly make use of every advanced feature in the facility.

On the first day alone, one group of graduate students learned to insert a G-tube into a high-fidelity infant manikin in a simulated hospital room. Another group gathered around tables equipped with flat-screens in the 70-seat, team-based-learning classroom. In between, students enjoyed quiet class prep in the dedicated Student Study Lounge (for all the details, see p. 24).

We are so grateful to our donors—principally Christine Schwartz, BSN ’70, and Nita and Phil Francis, but 2 |

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also many other friends and alumni, including the classes of 2017, 2018 and 2019—for enabling us to build this leading-edge, $6.1 million facility entirely with philanthropic gifts.

Other news in the college was less visible, but no less important. In 2019, we received redesignation—for the eighth consecutive four-year term—as a World Health Organization Collaborating Centre in Nursing and Midwifery, signaling our position at the highest level of “scientific and technical leadership” in nursing. Also, as the year began, we were eagerly anticipating word of our reaccreditation by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education, which we expect will be official later this fall.

The WHO designation, the CCNE accreditation and the investment by our generous donors all attest to the quality and integrity of UIC Nursing programs and faculty.

And this issue of Vital Signs contains dozens of other reasons every friend and alumnus of our fine college can feel exceptionally proud.

Terri E. Weaver, PhD, RN, FAAN, ATSF Professor and Dean

NOTEPAD

Scrub-a-dub Dunk!

For the first time, graduating BSN students at our newest campus, Springfield, took the plunge in their scrubs to celebrate the completion of their degree in nursing. In doing so, they joined the ranks of dozens of undergraduate classes who have made it a cherished, if unusual, UIC Nursing tradition to jump in a pool together shortly before graduation. The first occasion happened in Chicago in the early 1980s; Urbana adopted it in 2008. This was just the second BSN class to graduate from the Springfield campus.

Across all six UIC Nursing campuses and programs, there were 484 graduates in 2018-19.

UIC NURSING CLIMBS AGAIN IN 2020 U.S. NEWS RANKINGS

PUBLIC DNP

(#7 overall, up from #12 in 2019)

PUBLIC MS

(#16 overall, up from #18 in 2019) VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 3

NOTEPAD

Driving change in nurse practitioner education

Patty Billingsley, right, is one of the first recipients of the PracticeReady grant.

She is doing her immersive clinical experience at PCC Community Wellness in Berwyn, Illinois, where Fernando Velasquez, MS ’16, BSN ’11, left, is her preceptor. Velasquez is a graduate of the pilot program that led to PracticeReady.

Two new grants from the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration, together totaling $6 million, will allow UIC Nursing to prepare advanced practice nurses to work in some of the most high-need and challenging practice settings.

Immersive clinical experience for NP students Funded with nearly $2.7 million, the PracticeReady program will place about 20 UIC family nurse practitioner (FNP) and psychiatric-mental health nurse practitioner (PMHNP) students in immersive, multi-semester clinical experiences within community health settings for each year of the four-year program.

The idea is to give students a continuous clinical experience and avoid the steep learning curve that comes with hopping to different clinical sites each semester, says Charles Yingling, DNP ’12, MS ’05, FNP-BC, FAANP, UIC Nursing interim associate dean for practice and community partnerships.

Partner sites include PCC Community Wellness, the University of Illinois Hospital & Health Sciences System-Mile Square Health Center, Freeport (Ill.) Health Network, and Access Community Health Network in Chicago. Participating students will receive traineeship funding, which will cover their tuition for fall and spring semesters, and the practice sites will receive funding to designate clinicians to serve as clinical practice leaders for the students.

Post-graduate fellowship for APRNs The UIC College of Nursing is partnering with Erie Family Health Centers to create a one-year, postgraduate fellowship program called AdvancingPractice. The program will prepare newly graduated advanced practice nurses to lead healthcare improvements in underserved and rural communities.

Funded for four years through a $3.3 million grant, the program is open to APRNs from all over the country with specialties in family practice, pediatrics, adult gerontology or midwifery. Fellows will be selected through a competitive process and placed at a “home base” clinic in the Erie system. Throughout the fellowship year, they will rotate through specialties at many of Erie’s 13 Chicago-area locations, experiencing mentored clinical practice, as well as education and training in advanced clinical procedures, complex case management, and leadership and systems.

Yingling will serve as health education specialist on the grant, and several additional UIC Nursing faculty members will provide crucial aid in developing competency-based curricula, delivering the didactic components of the fellowship, and evaluating the program.

“Not only are we equipping new graduates to provide exceptional in-scope care for their APRN role,” says Yingling, “we’re equipping them to lead change in community health.”

“The unifying thread of these grants is that we, as a college, are now in a position to have significant influence over the entire continuum of nurse practitioner preparation.”

- Charles Yingling

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NOTEPAD

Zenk named to Hall of Fame

Nursing Collegiate Professor Shannon Zenk was inducted into the Sigma Theta Tau International Nurse Researcher Hall of Fame, one of 23 elite nurse researchers from across the world in the 2019 class of inductees.

Zenk, PhD, MS ’99, MPH, RN, FAAN, is widely-recognized as a pioneer in food desert research, bringing national attention to the fact that low-income, segregated neighborhoods are often bereft of healthy food options. Her research has led to new policies to improve access to healthy foods, such as the federal Healthy Food Financing Initiative and new retailer stocking requirements under food stamp programs WIC and SNAP. In two ongoing, nationwide projects, she’s now studying millions of Americans to identify how food, active living policies and environmental changes can improve the body weight and metabolic health of groups disproportionately affected by obesity.

As a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholar, she’s also partnering with colleagues to tackle pharmacy deserts in Chicago.

Zenk joins four other of our college’s faculty who are already in the Nurse Researcher Hall of Fame: UIC Nursing Dean Terri Weaver, PhD, RN, FAAN, ATSF; Associate Dean for Research Eileen Collins, PhD, RN, FAACVPR, FAAN, ATSF; Harriet H. Werley Endowed Chair in Nursing Research Carol Estwing Ferrans, PhD ’85, MS ’82, RN, FAAN; and Nursing Collegiate Professor Ardith Doorenbos, PhD, RN, FAAN.

U.S. SURGEON GENERAL VISITS UIC NURSING

U.S. Surgeon General VADM Jerome Adams, MD, MPH, was the featured speaker at an Illinois Department of Public Health press conference, hosted at the UIC College of Nursing in October 2018. The purpose was to release an IDPH report on maternal mortality and morbidity in Illinois, which included findings that 72% of maternal deaths were preventable. UIC Nursing’s clinical professor Carrie Klima, PhD, MS ’86, CRM, and clinical assistant professor Patrick Thornton, PhD ’16, CRM, sat on the IDPH committee that generated the report.

WEAVER CHOSEN TO DELIVER LECTURE OF EXCELLENCE UIC College of Nursing Dean Terri Weaver was selected to present the Thomas Roth Lecture of Excellence at SLEEP 2019, the world’s largest meeting devoted entirely to clinical sleep medicine and sleep circadian research. She is the first nurse ever selected to deliver the lecture.

Weaver, PhD, RN, FAAN, ATSF, is an internationally recognized expert on the effect of daytime sleepiness on daily behaviors, and her lecture focused on the effectiveness of sleep therapy.

Re-elected to AACN Weaver was re-elected to a two-year term as a member-atlarge of the Board of Directors of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing. AACN serves as the national voice for academic nursing and represents more than 820 member schools of nursing.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 5

NOTEPAD

Six faculty and alumnae inducted in 2019 class of AAN fellows Susan Dunn, PhD, RN, FAHA, associate professor, and Susan Walsh, DNP, MS ’00, BSN ’80, APRN, CPNP-PC, clinical associate professor, have been named fellows of the American Academy of Nursing.

Dunn and Walsh were among 231 nurse leaders chosen for induction in 2019. AAN fellowship is considered a significant milestone in a nurse leader’s career.

Dunn is one of the few investigators in the world studying hopelessness in individuals with heart disease.

Her comprehensive and innovative research program is founded on a conceptual analysis that distinguishes hopelessness from depression. Dunn recently received a $2.4 million NIH grant to advance “Heart Up!,” a program aimed at increasing physical activity and reducing hopelessness in heart disease patients. (See more, p. 31) In addition to Walsh’s work as director of UIC’s pediatric nurse practitioner programs and associate director of the Global Health Leadership Office, she leads faculty and graduate students to Haiti several times per year to provide primary healthcare at a clinic in the mountains near the capital city, Port-au-Prince. There, she and her interprofessional teams have worked to improve immediate and long-term outcomes for newborns.

The college also congratulates four alumni in the 2019 class of AAN fellows: Ching-Min Chen, PhD, BSN ’90, professor in the Department of Nursing, National Cheng Kung University in Tainan, Taiwan; Kathleen Kobler, PhD ’17, MS ’08, APRN coordinator at Advocate Children’s Hospital in Oak Lawn, Illinois; Linda Park, PhD, MS ’00, BSN ’96, assistant professor at the School of Nursing at the University of California, San Francisco; and Mayumi Willgerodt, PhD ’99, MS ’95, associate professor and vice chair of education at the University of Washington School of Nursing. In total, 101 UIC Nursing faculty and alumi are AAN fellows.

NEW LEADERS TAKE REINS Susan Corbridge, PhD ’09, APRN, FAANP, FAAN, has been named executive associate dean of the College of Nursing. She is a Susan Corbridge board-certified acute care nurse practitioner and maintains a clinical practice in the Department of Medicine, Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, Sleep & Allergy Medicine.

Corbridge was previously associate dean for practice and community partnerships.

Crystal Patil, PhD, has been named head of the Department of Women, Children and Family Health Science.

Recently Crystal Patil promoted to full professor, Patil joined the college in 2014 and has focused her research on evidence-based strategies to reduce health inequities globally among women and children.

COTLER INDUCTED AS FELLOW OF AANP Karen Cotler, DNP, FNP-BC, a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Health Systems Science, was one of 63 advanced practice nurse leaders inducted as fellows of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners in June 2019.

Cotler focuses her clinical practice on vulnerable and underserved populations. Her area of scholarship is focused on improving health outcomes for sexual- and gender-minority populations.

She is a family nurse practitioner at the college’s nurse-led clinic, Mile Square Health Center-Humboldt Park, and provides on-site primary care services for injection drug users at UIC’s Community Outreach Intervention Project West Side field office (See Epidemic, page16).

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NOTEPAD

Sen. Durbin talks practice with NP leaders Nursing leaders at UIC had the opportunity to meet with U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin on the Chicago campus in August 2019. Charles Yingling, DNP ’12, MS ’05, interim associate dean for practice and community partnerships in the college, and Carolyn Dickens, PhD ’17, APRN, assistant director of advanced practice providers in the hospital, informed Durbin about nurse practitioner practice in Illinois (including barriers NPs face in prescribing medication or home health), their role as primary care providers in rural communities, and the move toward doctoral-level NP education.

TWO FACULTY RECEIVE NATIONAL RECOGNITION

Clinical assistant professors Robin Adair Shannon, DNP ’17, MS ’09, RN, NCSN, PHNA-BC, and Cathy Yonkaitis, DNP ’17, RN, NCSN, PEL-CSN, PHNA-BC, were awarded the 2019 Presidential Recognition Award from the National Association of School Nurses for their efforts as co-editors of the third edition of School Nursing: A Comprehensive Text.

The student-centered textbook is the “go-to reference for school nursing and student health,” according to the National Association of School Nurses, with 39 peer-reviewed chapters representing the collective knowledge of 63 contributing authors.

In fall 2019, after 11 years as director of the college’s School Nurse Certificate Program, Yonkaitis stepped down, handing the reins to Shannon.

ALUM’S ART ENVISIONS WORLD WHERE EVERYONE HAS EQUAL CHANCE TO BE HEALTHY, SAFE AND HAPPY A piece of artwork by Jessica Lardizabal, BSN ’18—submitted to a National Academy of Medicine nationwide art contest called, “Young Leaders Visualize Health Equity”—has been selected for display in a permanent online gallery starting late in 2019. She used the medium of paper collage to create the piece, entitled, “Lift Me Up.”

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 7

NOTEPAD

Dressed for success Incoming students in Chicago, Springfield and Urbana certainly looked the part as they embarked on their first nursing degrees. In late August 2019, each of the three UIC Nursing campuses that offer prelicensure programs hosted a white coat ceremony for those students setting out to become RNs. The events recognized and affirmed new students’ commitment to becoming professional nurses who provide compassionate, high-quality care. In addition to being “cloaked” in their lab coats, the students collectively recited the UIC College of Nursing Oath, adapted from the Florence Nightingale Pledge and the American Nurses Association Code for Nurses.

Across all six campuses, the College of Nursing welcomed 1,525 new and continuing graduate and undergraduate students in fall 2019.

Future nurses celebrated in Urbana (top, left), Springfield (bottom, left) and Chicago (above).

NURSING ROCKS GIVING TUESDAY Donations to the College of Nursing during the annual day of philanthropy on Nov. 27, 2018, totaled nearly $19,000. The college topped all other campus units in a universitywide “contest” for the most donors, bringing in dollars from more than 150 individuals, nearly 100 of whom were students.

“It was absolutely amazing to see all of us come together as a community and rank first with the most donors for Giving Tuesday,” said Aileen Chan, a master’s degree student who helped lead the college’s Giving Tuesday initiative as president of the Graduate Student Nurses Organization. “Our giving spirit is reflective of who we are as nurses and leaders. We want to pave the way for other future nurses to excel.”

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In 2019, Giving Tuesday is Dec. 3. Help us shine again by making a gift at go.uic.edu/givetonursing.

NOTEPAD

ELEVEN UIC NURSING STUDENTS AND ALUMNI NAMED AS EMERGING LEADERS

A woman of influence Sheila Dinotshe Tlou, PhD ’90, RN, was named to AvanceMedia’s 2019 list of “100 Most Influential African Women,” putting her in the company of presidents, prime ministers, secretaries general and CEOs. Tlou is currently co-chair of two campaigns focused on global health: The Global HIV Prevention Campaign and the Nursing Now Global Campaign.

She was formerly minister of health of Botswana and UNAIDS regional director for eastern and southern Africa.

UIC Nursing leads on correctional healthcare quality UIC Nursing is leading an interprofessional team of experts on a $500,000 contract with the Illinois Department of Corrections to conduct a comprehensive quality improvement plan for the healthcare units in its 29 facilities.

Training for practitioners interested in correctional health With the help of a grant from the Rita and Alex Hillman Foundation, correctional health experts in the UIC College of Nursing have produced, “Introduction to corrections for those in health care.” The three-module training will allow practitioners to deepen their knowledge and understanding of topics pertinent to health education, services and advocacy within the correctional system.

Nurses can earn one (1) CNE credit per module at no cost through July 2020.

Check out the free training at correctionalhealthcare.nursing.uic.edu.

IDOC’s contract with the College of Nursing followed a class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of every prisoner in Illinois. The state is under a consent decree to make broad changes to medical and dental care for approximately 40,000 inmates.

UIC Nursing clinical assistant professor Marianne Durham, DNP, RN, CPPS, is co-leading the team. The plan will include recommendations on improving access to care, care coordination, medication safety and tracking, and analyzing and measuring for improvement.

Eleven UIC College of Nursing alumni, faculty members and students were chosen for the Illinois Nurses Foundation’s 5th annual, “40 Under 40 Emerging Nurse Leaders Award.”

The awards highlight and celebrate young nurse leaders who are shaping healthcare and the nursing profession today and are poised to shape it into the future.

The UIC Nursing-affiliated honorees in 2019 are: • Monika Barthelmes, BSN ’16 • Katherine Breen, current PhD student • Elena Caro, DNP ’18 • Kimberly Duback, MS ’14 • Alison Hernandez, PhD ’18 • Maureen (Molly) Hofmann, current DNP student • Michael Huyck, current DNP student • Michelle Martinez, current MS student • Melissa Sautter, MS ’11, current DNP student • Kimberly Wittmayer, MS ’10 • Ebonie Wright, current DNP student

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 9

NOTEPAD

School-based health center named after alum A renovated school-based community health center that opened on Chicago’s South Side in March 2019 was named in honor of three-time UIC College of Nursing alumna Cynthia “Cee” Barnes-Boyd, PhD ’90, MSN ’79, BSN ’75, RN, FAAN. Barnes-Boyd spearheaded the clinic’s relocation and renovation prior to her death in 2017 at age 64. At the time, she was director of the UIC Office of Community Engagement and Neighborhood Health Partnerships.

Leaders from UI Health and Chicago Public Schools, along with the family of the late “Cee” Barnes-Boyd, celebrated the opening of the Cynthia Barnes-Boyd/ Drake Health and Wellness Center in March 2019.

BOTH PHOTOS CREDIT: SEBASTIAN ORTIZ

The Cynthia Barnes-Boyd/Drake Health and Wellness Center is part of the UI Health Mile Square Health Center network of federally qualified health centers and is located on-site at John B. Drake Elementary School, which is part of CPS, near the intersection of State and 26th streets.

Barnes-Boyd oversaw all of Mile Square’s school-based health centers during her tenure at UIC. “Today we celebrate not only this ceremonial ribbon-cutting and the opening of a new school-based health and wellness center; we also commemorate the life and legacy of Dr. Cee Barnes-Boyd,” said Robert Barish, vice chancellor for health affairs at UI Health, during the event.

UIC NURSING LAUNCHES ALUMNI MENTORSHIP PROGRAM Mentored employees have been found to receive higher compensation and more promotions and to feel more committed to their careers. Mentors get a boost, too, reporting greater job satisfaction and commitment to their organization. That’s why—with leadership from task force chair Beena Peters, DNP ’17, MS ’94, RN, system chief nursing officer at Cook County Health Systems—the UIC College of Nursing Alumni Mentor Program launched in July 2019 to connect mid-career and seasoned alumni with early career alumni. For alumni still wishing to join the program, sign-up for 2020 will be available next summer. Look for details in future alumni newsletters.

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Support on every avenue In roughly 15 years, people age 65+ are projected to outnumber children for the first time in U.S. history. Associate professor Valerie Gruss is leading a host of initiatives to help ensure Illinois is building age-friendly health systems and dementia-friendly communities.

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he signs are there if you know what to look for. A woman’s lights are shut off, not because she doesn’t have the money, but because she forgot to pay her bill. A man keeps landing in the emergency room because he didn’t remember to take his heart medication. An octogenarian wanders away from home, then returns, saying she was lost.

These are signs of dementia that Valerie Gruss, PhD, APRN, CNP-BC, FAAN, knows well.

As an advanced practice nurse who has spent her career studying older adults, she also knows that our nation is critically underprepared for the health needs of a fast-growing population of older adults—not least of all, the challenges that come with the memory-stealing disease.

With millions of dollars in grants from the U.S. Human Resources and Services Association, Gruss is on a mission to create age-friendly health systems and dementia-friendly communities across Illinois and beyond.

She and Memoona Hasnain, professor of family medicine at UIC, have assembled a team of interprofessional experts on aging to create ENGAGE-IL. Nine programs under the ENGAGE-IL umbrella are helping seniors “age in place,” including a free mobile app, the Dementia Guide Expert; a library of more than 20 online learning modules on geriatrics for healthcare professionals; and a partnership with the city of Chicago to train managers of high-rise buildings to recognize the signs of dementia (see graphic on p. 12 for more on all nine programs).

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 11

Issues that affect seniors aren’t confined to nursing homes and hospitals. Through nine programs, Gruss and her ENGAGE-IL team are making sure that families, practitioners and caregivers have the tools they need to help aging adults in various environments.

1 A house call program with UI Health helps assess the living environment for homebound adults.

2 Hospital practitioners, clinicians and students learn to work with older populations and earn free education credits through 23 online modules.

3 A mobile app called the Dementia Guide Expert gives the general public resources to understand dementia.

4 In senior living communities, students and practitioners conduct health fairs, screenings, education and fall prevention trainings.

5 In Chicago high-rise apartments, building managers are trained to develop dementia-friendly communities.

7 A summer scholarship brings university students together from six disciplines to understand issues that affect older adults.

8 Clinicians at select primary care clinics complete an Interprofessional Geriatric Certification Program to learn to respond to the needs of aging adults.

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n estimated 5.7 million Americans aged 65 and older were living with Alzheimer’s disease as of 2017, according to the CDC, and as the U.S. population grays, that number is expected to almost triple in the next 30 years. While early onset dementia can occur in younger adults, it is most common for people over the age of 65.

There is no cure for dementia, and on average, people live with the disease for eight to 10 years.

“This is a disease that can be devastating and overwhelming to caregivers and loved ones,” Gruss says. “Our goal is to educate people on Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias, because most clinicians and the general population don’t have a full and accurate understanding of what it is or how to manage the symptoms of dementia. We’re trying to give people the tools to understand what’s going on and help them better manage this disease.”

Creating Vertical Independent Villages

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n Chicago, Gruss’ team is taking an innovative approach to reaching vulnerable older adults living alone in high-rise apartment and condo buildings. These are buildings that are not specifically designed for seniors, but nonetheless may have hundreds of seniors living in them.

Through a contract with the city of Chicago’s Age-Friendly Chicago Commission, she is making a training available to building staffers to help them recognize signs of dementia, identify problems

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9 A contract with the Illinois Department of Corrections means correctional officers in prisons are learning to handle a graying population.

Dementia looms large

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6 A program called OPT-OUT Opioid Awareness works with community pharmacies on weaning older adults off opioids.

their residents may be having, and connect senior residents with appropriate services and resources. Gruss estimates she will train more than 100 managers, creating dementia-friendly buildings, one building at a time.

“The building management staff are the people engaging with these older adult residents 24-7,” Gruss says. “They’re the ones who see them every day. They’re the ones who will notice subtle changes and now, through our program, can connect [seniors] with needed services.”

Gruss worked with the city of Chicago to establish a hotline for building managers to reach the Illinois Department on Aging, connecting older adult residents with appropriate services rather than having building managers call 911 or sending seniors to the emergency department.

Margaret Shamberger, regional director of Lieberman Management Services, which manages high-rise condo buildings throughout Chicago, elected to take part in the program. She says one of her building managers noticed a resident who was wandering and seemed disoriented and confused. The building manager called the city and eventually got connected to the right department, but Shamberger says not all manager are as savvy, and the new hotline will “streamline the process for managers.”

“When there’s an issue—such as a resident who is missing and found in the stairwell—who do they call?” she says. “This training offers resources and phone numbers through the city for property managers to be able to get assistance.”

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Lack of geriatricians

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oday, there are 49 million people in the U.S. over the age of 65, but in 15 years, that number will grow to 78 million people.

Then, for the first time ever, there will be more seniors than children in the U.S. At the same time, the number of healthcare workers trained in geriatrics is not keeping pace.

Gruss picked for leadership role Valerie Gruss was chosen to be UIC Nursing’s first director of interprofessional education, leading efforts to engage with students, faculty and staff from a variety of academic disciplines.

“There’s a lack of geriatricians,” Gruss says. “We need specialized, trained people to work with the older adult population because the care that’s needed is very different. And yet fewer and fewer people are entering geriatrics, getting certified in geriatrics or even working in the field.”

“Interprofessional education and collaborative practice has been a passion of mine since coming to UIC,” Gruss says. “My goal is for UIC College of Nursing graduates to be fully prepared for teamwork and collaborative practice and to be leaders of systematic change in healthcare delivery leading to a more collaborative team model.”

That’s why a number of Gruss’ ENGAGE-IL programs focus on healthcare providers, offering training on comprehensive, patient-centered care for older adults. These include the online learning modules, an interprofessional internship for students and a certification program for primary care clinicians.

She’s one of the pioneers of interprofessional education at UIC, helping to found the first campuswide IPE Immersion Day in spring 2013. Now an annual event, it has grown to include more than 1,000 students and 100 faculty facilitators from all of UIC’s seven health science colleges and all regional campuses.

As the baby boomers age, many are choosing to live independently.

And while there are many advantages—it can be less expensive than a nursing home or assisted living facility and more comfortable—it also means older adults are sometimes in isolation. Still, Gruss says relatively simple solutions could allow them to maintain their independence. For instance, a senior who forgets to take his or her medication could purchase a medication box with an alarm on it.

In 2018, Gruss co-chaired UIC’s inaugural symposium for Interprofessional Education, Collaborative Practice and Scholarship.

“Our goal here is to enable people to age in place,” Gruss says. “We don’t have to institutionalize them. In many cases, we can provide appropriate home services and resources to assist the older adult so that they can continue to live independently and safely in the community.”

Gruss’ project to improve geriatric care, ENGAGE-IL, is a model of interprofessionalism. It includes a team of leaders from the College of Medicine, School of Public Health, College of Applied Health Sciences and College of Pharmacy, all working collaboratively to enhance the care provided to older adults by building age-friendly health systems and establishing dementia-friendly communities.

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VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 13

In 2019, the UIC College of Nursing conferred its 41st annual Distinguished Alumni Award and honored the second class of Outstanding Alumni Achievement Award winners.

MARIANN PIANO n 1980, just a year out of nursing school, Mariann Piano, PhD ’88, MS ’84, RN, FAAN, FAHA, accepted a job as a nurse in the cardiac intensive care unit of the University of Illinois Hospital.

She began to notice that many of her patients were young and should have been healthy, yet they were dying of heart failure. At the time, cardiovascular disease was at its peak in the U.S. Awareness of how lifestyle factors, including tobacco and alcohol use, could result in cardiovascular disease was just beginning to emerge.

“I saw quite a few young patients that had these enlarged hearts; they had alcoholic cardiomyopathy,” she says. “I became very interested in studying the clinical condition.”

Piano did just that—going on to get her master’s and doctoral degrees from UIC Nursing and spending three decades positioning herself as a leading expert on the effects of unhealthy alcohol consumption on the cardiovascular system.

“I am who I am, hugely because of my education at UIC and because of my strong mentors.”

Piano is now senior associate dean for research and Nancy and Hilliard Travis Professor of Nursing at Vanderbilt University School of Nursing. Her scientific contributions have directly led to the understanding that alcohol is toxic to the heart, which has further shaped national policy regarding safe limits for the consumption of alcoholic beverages. Her current research focuses on the effects of binge drinking on the cardiovascular systems of young adults.

“Dr. Piano is a dedicated leader, committed to broad-scale change,” wrote Vanderbilt Professor of Nursing Mary Jo Gilmer, PhD, MS ’78, MBA, RN-BC, FAAN, in her nominating letter for Piano. “Her pioneering spirit and work with youth has impacted clinical practice and led to a better understanding of the need for prevention and treatment of alcohol-related cardiovascular conditions.”

Piano is also professor emerita at UIC Nursing after a more than 30-year career with the college, where she pioneered research with animal models and served as head of the Department of Biobehavioral Health Science.

“I am who I am, hugely because of my education at UIC and because of my strong mentors,” Piano says.

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Julia Muennich Cowell

Jehad Omar Halabi

Judith McDevitt

Mary Crabtree Tonges

In 1962, Julia Muennich Cowell took her first job as a nurse, working for the Cincinnati Department of Public Health in a public school district. That set the stage for a career focused on the study and improvement of school nursing.

When Jehad Omar Halabi, PhD ’96, was 3 months old, her parents found her unconscious and rushed her to an Italian hospital in her home country of Jordan.

Judith McDevitt’s story comes, she says, “from the department of late bloomers.”

When Mary Crabtree Tonges, PhD, MS ’77, MBA, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, began the master’s degree program at UIC Nursing, she thought she wanted to be a clinical nurse specialist.

Cowell, PhD, MS ’74, RN, APHN-BC, FAAN, spent 25 years as a faculty member at UIC, where she co-developed the school nurse certification program in 1985. She currently serves as executive editor of The Journal of School Nursing.

In 1999, Cowell took a position as professor and chair of community and mental health nursing at Rush University but continued to serve as adjunct professor at UIC until 2004.

“My father made the promise then,” Halabi recalls. “If I survived, I would become a doctor or nurse.”

The prophecy proved true: She went on get a bachelor’s of nursing degree from the University of Jordan and her doctorate from UIC Nursing.

Halabi says hearing about that early experience with “foreign” doctors and nurses gave her an appreciation for international healthcare. It has become a theme of her career.

Of all her accomplishments, Cowell says she takes most pride in the achievements of the students and junior faculty that she mentored.

Now an associate professor with the College of Nursing, King Saud bin Abdulaziz University–Health Sciences in Al Ahsa, Saudi Arabia, Halabi is a frequent keynote speaker at international conferences.

“When you have students who excel or faculty who get their first grants, that is thrilling,” she says.

“My experiences while a graduate student at UIC were tremendous and unforgettable,” she says.

McDevitt, PhD ’97, MS ’90, BSN ’88, RN, arrived at nursing later in life. She was well over 30—a wife and mother working in medical publishing—when she decided she wanted to go back to school to become a nurse. Her associate’s degree led to a bachelor’s, then a master’s, and ultimately a PhD. “I really wanted to be doing healthcare and not just keep reading about it,” she says.

Now a UIC Nursing clinical associate professor emerita, McDevitt spent more than 16 years on the faculty at UIC Nursing, where she led the family nurse practitioner program and was a founding practitioner in the college’s nurse-managed clinic (now part of UI Health’s Mile Square Health Center).

“Things do change,” she says. “If there’s something on your bucket list you’ve had to delay, by all means see if you can still do it later on.”

Read extended bios of each alumni award winner at our website go.uic.edu/MeetNursingAlumni. Alumni award nominations are accepted year-round at go.uic.edu/NursingAlumAwards.

When she left, she knew she wanted a career in nurse leadership.

“My experience at UIC changed my career path pretty dramatically,” she says.

Tonges has spent the majority of her career in executive leadership positions, including serving as senior vice president and chief nursing officer at the University of North Carolina Hospitals and associate dean for UNC Health Care in the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing from 2002 until her retirement in 2016.

Her research is focused on the job satisfaction of staff nurses and care delivery models.

“It’s the nurse’s job to take care of the patients, and it’s my job to take care of the nurses,” she says.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 15

Overdose may be the most serious, but it’s not the only health threat facing growing numbers of Americans who inject opioids and other drugs. Hampered by addiction, people who use drugs often avoid seeking any type of healthcare.

Now, UIC clinicians are meeting people who use drugs where they are, opening an innovative primary care clinic at a busy Chicago needle-exchange site.

I

t’s a sunny Friday in April, and Karen Cotler knows she doesn’t have much time. Her patient, Marissa, is in a hurry.

With her ride waiting outside, Marissa has what she came here for: a bundle of clean needles, water and alcohol pads.

Clinical assistant professor of nursing Karen Cotler, FNP, is delivering primary care to drug users in a place where they already feel safe.

The two women are at the West Side field office of UIC’s Community Outreach Intervention Project (COIP), a busy needle-exchange site located in a strip of aging brick buildings near Madison Street and Cicero Avenue. The windows are plastered with signs that advertise “Free Condoms” and “HIV Testing.”

Cotler, DNP, FNP-BC, FAANP, a family nurse practitioner and clinical assistant professor in the UIC College of Nursing, races to catch Marissa before she leaves.

Like most of Cotler’s patients here, Marissa (not her real name) suffers from addiction, but it’s only one of her health concerns. She also has untreated Addison’s disease and skin infections where she injects drugs.

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It’s common for people who use drugs to go long periods of time without seeking healthcare. So now, healthcare is seeking them.

Through an innovative collaboration, the UIC College of Nursing is joining UIC’s School of Public Health and College of Medicine to operate a weekly clinic at the needle-exchange site. In years past, COIP clients presenting with illness or injury might get a recommendation from staffers to visit a doctor or an emergency room— advice they might or might not heed. Now they can get primary care, wound care, hepatitis C treatment and treatment for opioid dependence right on site.

Eventually Cotler convinces Marissa to let her look at a wound that was evident during Marissa’s last visit two weeks prior. In a small windowless room, Marissa lowers her track pants to reveal an angry, red circle on her thigh.

(Top) A COIP client meets with a staff member to get clean needles, water and alcohol pads. (Bottom left) The clinic operates every Friday in COIP’s West Side field office, an unassuming storefront located on a strip near Madison Street and Cicero Avenue. (Bottom right) UIC Nursing DNP student Michael Huyck cleans the wounds that a client has developed from injecting drugs. Huyck is doing his DNP project on wound care guides for practitioners.

BY THE NUMBERS

$78.5 BILLION

Economic burden of opioid misuse in U.S., including healthcare, lost productivity, addiction treatment and criminal justice involvement

Confronting a public health crisis For more than three decades, the UIC School of Public Health has operated COIP as a way to reduce the spread of HIV and AIDS by providing HIV testing and sterile needles to people who inject drugs.

The services are needed now more than ever as the opioid epidemic remains a growing public health crisis. There are more than 750,000 people in the U.S. who currently inject drugs, according to the journal American Family Physician.

Among those individuals, skin and soft tissue infections are the most common medical complication and the top reason for hospitalization.

Care providers and clients at COIP say the expanded clinical services, supported by a $100,000 grant from the Hearst Foundation, are reaching a population that needs primary care in a place that they feel safe and already visit regularly.

“One of the big problems for COIP staff was that they would see clients come in with acute medical problems and they’d refer them to other clinics, but [the clients were] reluctant to go,” says Stockton Mayer, assistant professor at the UIC College of Medicine and director of Urban Global

Health. “They didn’t feel those clinics were sympathetic to some of the stuff they dealt with in their addiction, and frankly, sometimes they were just embarrassed to be interacting with other people.”

Instead of seeking timely care, in many cases, clients would let the wounds fester until visiting an emergency room was their last option, he says.

“What we saw was a huge healthcare need,” Mayer says. “Skin and soft tissue infections and wound care were main priorities.

Things like hepatitis C and psychiatric care were also on the forefront of clients’ minds.

We thought this was a great opportunity to expand services.”

Mayer knew UIC Nursing assistant professor Gabriel Culbert, PhD ’12, BSN ’04, RN, whose research addresses problems of drug dependence in Indonesian prisons. At Mayer’s invitation, Culbert joined the team submitting the grant proposal to Hearst, making the College of Nursing, College of Medicine and School of Public Health equal partners in the project. (More on Culbert’s integrated research study on p. 19] “It’s been a great multidisciplinary approach to a really significant problem,” Mayer says.

30

PERCENT

How much more people with drug dependence utilize emergency healthcare services than the general population

38-68

PERCENT

Prevalence of hepatitis C among injection drug users

2.4

MILLION

People in the U.S. living with hepatitis C in 2016

27

PERCENT

COIP clients who sought care for a skin or soft tissue infection in a 12-month period

Source: CDC, COIP

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 17

Ismael, a longtime client of COIP’s West Side field office, gets a blood pressure check. Clinicians there discovered that he had high blood pressure and put him on low-dose medication. He calls the clinic “the greatest thing they’ve done.”

The one-year Hearst grant jump-started the clinic, but the goal is for it to live on—becoming self-sustaining through insurance reimbursements on behalf of the many patients who have Medicaid-managed plans.

Somebody cares The fact that clients have a trusted relationship with COIP makes them much more likely to feel comfortable receiving medical care there. Many of the staff working there are peers—people who are themselves recovering from drug dependence and who can relate to clients’ experiences.

Ismael, who has been coming to the West Side COIP field office for four or five years, says the clinic is “the greatest thing they’ve done.” He says the clinicians discovered his high blood pressure and put him on a low-dose medication. He says they treat him and other clients “like family.”

“People can come and [get care] and not feel ashamed because everybody here is just like them,” he says. “I think that’s the most beautiful thing.”

He adds: “At least somebody cares, you know?”

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A program with a plan Primary care services through COIP are already growing. Beyond the brick-and-mortar clinic, care is also available on COIP’s mobile van, reaching more people where they are. Also, there’s a plan to offer services at the center more than once a week.

Cotler is especially pleased that, as they deliver primary care, clinicians are confronting two public health crises: opioid addiction and hepatitis C. Through COIP, they can treat patients for both. She and Sarah Messmer, a UIC physician, are now approved to offer Suboxone treatment, oral film that helps drug addicts decrease their craving for opioids.

“If in the time I’m there, I get one person to stay on Suboxone and not go back to IV heroin, that would be worth all the effort,” Cotler says.

“Their lives are structured around needs related to their addiction: Fear of feeling sick, fear of withdrawing, where to get money or go for drugs,” he says. “It affects their motivations and ability to wait.”

The providers recognize that they may need to do things differently than they would in a more conventional clinic. For instance, they prioritize treating someone before getting that patient entered into a computer system.

Cotler has held Marissa’s attention, handing her samples of antibiotics and hydrocortisone and quickly relating the instructions. She calls in Michael Huyck, a UIC Nursing DNP student who is creating wound care guides for practitioners as his DNP project. He has molded himself into the clinic’s expert on wound care. He takes a quick look at the wound on Marissa’s thigh and joins Cotler in imploring her to take the medicine to stem the infection.

“Safe with us”

Marissa says she will.

Back on that sunny April day, the clinic was already buzzing before Marissa arrived.

Messmer and Cotler are both seeing patients, but there’s only one exam room.

Clients there to get clean needles need to wait their turn for clinical services. That can be a challenge for this population, says Antonio “Dave” Jimenez, COIP director.

“How else are you doing?” Cotler asks sincerely. “Nobody’s bothering you?”

Marissa shakes her head no. Cotler tells her about Suboxone. Marissa says she wants to try it.

“You know you’re safe with us,” Cotler says.

•

PREVENTING SKIN AND SOFT TISSUE INFECTIONS

M

ore than 750,000 people in the U.S. currently inject drugs. Among those individuals, skin and soft tissue infections are the most common medical complication and the top reason for hospitalization, according to an article in the journal American Family Physician.

In the hopes of preventing infections and keeping people out of the emergency room, UIC Nursing assistant professor Gabriel Culbert, PhD ‘12, BSN ‘04, RN, is conducting a pilot project to test the effectiveness of different ways to clean injection sites. The study is funded by the same grant from the Hearst Foundation that helped start up a clinic at the West Side field office of UIC’s Community Outreach Intervention Project (COIP).

“People are getting terrible wounds and abscesses,” he says. “This study is to start to get a handle on what’s causing this and how can we prevent it.”

With clients at the West Side COIP location as his study participants, he’s asking half the participants to clean their skin with alcohol pads, while the other half uses a substance called chlorhexidine.

The alcohol pads kill 99% of bacteria on a skin’s surface if it’s allowed to dry, but doesn’t retain antimicrobial properties, Culbert says. Chlorhexidine, on the other hand, is what hospital workers use to clean skin before surgery and has seven days of antimicrobial activity.

Culbert wonders if chlorhexidine might better protect the skin, especially for drug users who inject multiple times a day.

“Our population injects two, three or four times a day,” he says. “Let’s say, for the morning injection, they’re swabbing with chlorhexidine. The idea is, even if they forget to swab later in the afternoon, they’re still getting some antimicrobial activity.”

Culbert says the pilot will allow him to see if there’s enough evidence for a clinical trial.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 19

PHOTO CREDIT: IMAN KHAN

SPEAKING UP

The speech Elijah Hernandez, BSN ’19, RN, gave at the Springfield pinning ceremony drew a standing ovation and a few tears.

As Elijah Hernandez stepped up to the podium, he took a long, slow breath and faced the room of 200 people. He wore a gray vest, glasses and a neutral expression on his face, but inside, his mind was churning. His legs felt like lead. This moment would’ve seemed improbable only a few years earlier. As a child, Hernandez was diagnosed with high-functioning autism (then-called Asperger’s syndrome). He grew up in a low-income home in Chicago and was homeless for a period of time during college.

When his classmates unanimously chose him to represent them as the student speaker at the April 27, 2019, Springfield pinning ceremony, it was so unexpected and overwhelming to him that his reaction was to laugh.

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“When I was a kid, I used to read the dictionary like a regular book. The younger version of me also didn’t talk much, avoided everyone like the plague and spent hours at a time playing on the computer.”

He had little public speaking experience, and as someone on the autism spectrum, social communication is a challenge. But Hernandez’ classmates didn’t give him much choice. They wanted to hear from him. And when he got down to preparing his remarks, he knew he had a lot to say.

“Fun fact: when I was a kid, I used to read the dictionary like a regular book,” he began in the opening lines of his speech. “The younger version of me also didn’t talk much, avoided everyone like the plague and spent hours at a time playing on the computer.”

The day he was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome—which can include difficulty with social interactions, narrow and intense interests, repetitive behaviors, sensory processing challenges and neuro-motor differences—“was the day I became the kid with autism in my family,” he said in his speech.

Seeing his mom’s work as a hospital admissions coordinator made him interested in becoming a doctor, but when a friend in high school suggested nursing, he says “a light bulb lit up.”

Nursing would give him a “behind the scenes” role in healing and connecting with patients.

Hernandez began his college career at UIC in Chicago with the help of scholarship funding. But when he was waitlisted for the BSN program, which admits students only after they’ve attained two years of college-level coursework, he feared that he would run out of money before he could graduate.

Luckily, he received an email offering him a spot at the Springfield campus.

The move to Springfield was difficult. His parents were getting divorced and he was even homeless for a few days.

His instinct when he arrived in Springfield was to isolate himself and retreat into his computer for comfort, just as he had done in childhood. But he connected with peers who affectionately dubbed themselves, “the Waitlisters,” fellow transplants from Chicago who also previously attended UIC. Nursing requires complex social interactions, and many of his classes and experiences took him out of his comfort zone, but the camaraderie among his

classmates propelled him to success.

Standing at the podium that day, the first person in his family to finish college, he talked about “redefining family.”

“The most profound realization I would have was that somewhere over the course of these past two years, this class became a part of my family, too.”

When Hernandez stopped speaking, the audience stood and applauded.

Springfield campus director Cynthia Reese, PhD, MS ’95, RN, CNE, described the moment as “one of the highlights of [her] career as a nurse educator.”

At her table, someone noticed that Hernandez wasn’t wearing the $100 pin that symbolizes the transition from student to nurse. Reese explained he couldn’t afford it. The person, who wants to remain anonymous, was so moved by his story, she offered to buy it for him.

Hernandez is now an RN working on the neurology/neurosurgery unit at Memorial Medical Center in Springfield.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 21

FOCUS ON EDUCATION

Welcome to Bootcamp

New summer program introduces incoming students to the rigors of nursing school For new students, the unique challenges of nursing school can seem overwhelming—not only in terms of academic rigor, but also in the volume and pace of the work.

To help students feel better prepared, faculty at UIC Nursing’s Urbana campus have developed a dynamic introductory program for incoming BSN and graduate-entry MS students. First offered in 2018 at the college’s Urbana, Springfield and Chicago campuses, the “Transition to Nursing” program has earned a reputation as a sort of nursing bootcamp—minus the push-ups and loud drill instructors.

(Top) Students hear from faculty about the realities of nursing school.

(Bottom) Senior BSN student Natale Brunnelle (left) chats with junior Virginia Tufte to reassure the incoming student that, in the UIC Nursing community, “you can really get through anything.”

That welcome involves educating students on how to budget their study time, introducing them to available academic resources and supports, and providing an overview of the medical terminology and math equations they will need to know in their first courses.

Now in just its second year, the transition program— designed by clinical assistant professor Celeste Schultz, PhD, RN, teaching associates Alisha Carter, RN, and Cathy Leipold, RN, and simulation lab coordinator Samantha Bothwell, RN—is becoming an essential experience for new, non-RN students at UIC Nursing.

“Faculty recognized that we had a small number of students in each [class] who were struggling,” says Krista Jones, DNP ’11, MS ’07, PHNA-BC, RN, director of UIC Nursing’s Urbana campus. She adds that a small percentage of students admitted to the BSN and grad-entry MS programs become decelerated in their first year, a result of failing one of their courses.

First-year BSN student Allie Gade says the transition program opened her eyes to the realities of nursing school. While admitting the expectations for new students were overwhelming at first—“They really drilled in that we have to plan our days by the hour,” she says— she also felt the transition program would help her to meet those expectations.

“We’re trying to lower those numbers,” she says. “This is our way of welcoming them into the profession and getting them on the best possible path for success.”

Kacie Trapp, another new BSN student, praised the transition program for offering a “realistic view” of what students should expect.

“This program is giving us more insight into the challenges we’re going to experience, but it’s also giving us a lot of strategies for how to cope and how to effectively handle the program,” she says.

Natale Brunelle took part in the inaugural Transition to Nursing event in 2018. Now a senior, she returned to the transition program in 2019, this time as a peer mentor.

“People hear horror stories that [nursing school] is going to be very difficult, but if you have a community, you can really get through anything,” she says. Brunnelle was one of several seniors on hand to help calm nerves.

“It’s a team environment,” she says. “It’s a family; that’s why I came back today.”

Encouraged by the enthusiasm of participants, faculty now plan to collect data to evaluate whether the program is truly delivering its intended outcomes.

“From the information we collect, we can build up the program and also help facilitate similar programs at other schools,” Schultz says.

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THE FUTURE OF NURSING EDUCATION The M. Christine Schwartz Experiential Learning & Simulation Laboratory opened to students this fall after getting a $6.1 million makeover.

The Schwartz Lab was 100% philanthropically funded, principally with gifts from M. Christine Schwartz and Nita and Phil Francis.

O

n the lower level of the UIC Nursing building in Chicago, in what appears to be a well-equipped hospital room—with working hospital bed, vital signs monitor, sink and IV pole and pump—there’s a patient presenting with severe abdominal pain. A group of advanced practice nursing students will need to get a history, conduct a physical exam and order the right tests in order to diagnose the patient’s condition.

Everything has the look and feel of an authentic—and perhaps dire—medical situation, except for one thing: It’s not a real patient. It’s a high-fidelity manikin, operated by lab coordinator Kelly White, DNP ’19, RN, who is seated in a control room behind a one-way mirror. White is the voice of the patient, speaking into a microphone that emits her voice through the manikin’s mouth.

She can also change its heart and respiratory

rate in response to the students’ actions or inaction.

“She’s actually having a GI bleed, so they’ll need to get scans of her belly and start giving blood products,” White says. “If it gets to a point where they’re stuck and the patient’s not getting better, we’ll end the simulation and debrief, talking through their approach.”

This high-fidelity simulation room is one of eight in the newly renovated M. Christine Schwartz Experiential Learning & Simulation Laboratory. The 15,000-square-foot lab was funded entirely with philanthropic dollars, primarily with a $5 million donation from Christine Schwartz, BSN ’70. It boasts a 10-bed “ER” and skills lab, five nurse practitioner office rooms, a mental health assessment room, a student lounge, and even a model apartment for home health simulations.

(continued on page 26)

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 23

Introducing the M. Christine Schwartz Experiential Learning & Simulation Laboratory

TBL CLASSROOM

The team-based-learning classroom for 70 students has grouped seating.

Students can work in small teams at tables equipped with flat screens on which they can share completed work with the whole class.

STUDENT STUDY LOUNGE

Nursing school can be intense, and Schwartz recognized that students need a quiet space of their own to work and prepare for the lab experience.

HIGH-FIDELITY SIMULATION ROOMS

There are now eight high-fidelity rooms (up from two) where students can practice their skills in realistic settings, including standardized in-patient rooms, the Nita & Phil Francis Family Birthing Suite, a mental health room and a home care setting. Each one has a control room attached.

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STUDENT-CENTERED DESIGN

NITA & PHIL FRANCIS FAMILY BIRTHING SUITE

This facility perfectly simulates a birthing suite with the use of high-tech, high-fidelity SimMom™ and SimBaby™ manikins.

From hallway nooks, to a “living wall,” to a meditation room and lactation room, the Schwartz Lab was designed with students in mind.

MAIN LAB & EXAM ROOMS

A 10-bed skills lab features fully equipped functional head wall units and up-to-date technology. It can also be converted to a simulated ER. Five nurse practitioner exam rooms can be set up as primary care clinic rooms.

HOME CARE SETTING

A fully furnished living room, kitchen, bedroom and bathroom allow students to practice skills for patients across the life span in a home care setting.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 25

(continued from page 23)

Among the lab’s unique features is the Nita & Phil Francis Family Birthing Suite, named for the couple who donated a $1 million gift to the Schwartz Lab (see page 27).

In short, the lab offers students a chance to practice treating patients of all ages in multiple healthcare settings, so they’re prepared for what they might encounter in real nursing situations.

“In this lab, we can follow the same ‘simulated’ patient through the lifespan—from birth in the Francis Family Birthing Suite to later in life, when he or she is in need of skilled nursing care at home,” says Dean Terri Weaver, PhD, RN, FAAN, ATSF. “Students can practice skills in a low-stakes environment, making mistakes and learning from them without fear of harming a patient.”

“I think of it as a keystone, the foundational building block for the future of nursing education at the university.”

—M. Christine Schwartz Three years in the making The renovation builds on the college’s first experiential learning facilities, which opened in 2014, also funded by Schwartz. Three years in the making, the expansion greatly increases capacity and offers the latest in experiential and simulated technology. It’s the result of intensive research into the best nursing education facilities in the country.

“It’s amazing to finally see the completion of the simulation lab,” Schwartz says. “I think of it as a keystone, the foundational building block for the future of nursing education at the university.”

Susan Kilroy, MSN, RN, director of the Clinical Learning Resource Center, which includes the Schwartz Lab, says one of the big benefits of simulation is that it allows faculty to be the architects of deliberate learning opportunities, creating “high risk, low volume” scenarios that are important for any nurse to learn.

“When students participate in their clinical rotations, faculty cannot control the patients they care for or the diagnoses they encounter,” Kilroy says. “During a clinical rotation, a student may care for a patient with diabetes, but may never encounter a critical state known as diabetic ketoacidosis, or DKA. In the Schwartz Lab, we can create this condition, so students can recognize the signs and symptoms of DKA and think critically through the scenario.

Schwartz says she’s excited by the “endless possibilities” the lab can create.

“Whether students go to work in a hospital, a public health setting, or a community clinic in another part of the world, the skills they learn in this lab will touch hundreds if not thousands of lives,” she says.

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WHAT DOES HIGH-FIDELITY MEAN? High-fidelity means “striving to mimic the real world as closely as possible,” says Schwartz Lab director Susan Kilroy, MSN, RN. In simulated hospital rooms, a home health apartment and a mental health room, students can work with standardized patients or high-fidelity manikins. These manikins have breath sounds, heart tones and palpable pulses; they can cough, cry, have seizures and turn blue. From the control room, a simulation tech controls the manikin’s voice and other functions, and the simulations can be recorded if requested by faculty.

There’s simulated resuscitation equipment at each bedside, and working sinks and IV pumps that match those used by major hospitals. In the skills lab, students can practice putting in peripheral IVs using catheters and get “flashback” (simulated blood return) just like in a real patient.

In the Nita & Phil Francis Family Birthing Suite, SimMom™ can give birth to a baby. Simulations can create emergency situations such as shoulder dystocia, adherent placenta or postpartum hemorrhaging (with simulated fluid as “blood”). SimBaby™ has a realistic model of an infant airway, can cry and has the capability to simulate APGAR scoring at birth.

IMPACT

Giving new life to lessons about childbirth

Retired nurse Nita Francis wanted to see Illinois’ top public nursing school outfitted with the industry’s best resources for learning labor and delivery.

part of the expanded Schwartz Lab (see p. 23). It was a natural fit for the couple, both of whom are alumni of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Nita Francis also sits on the U of I Foundation board of directors.

After having her first two children, Nita Francis realized she wanted to help other women through the same experience by teaching childbirth education and nutrition classes.

Although she already had a bachelor’s degree, she decided to go back to school to get a degree in nursing.

Though Francis earned her nursing degree elsewhere, she discovered the UIC College of Nursing through her ties to the University of Illinois System and came to admire the college for its commitment to preparing clinician scientists.

She then dedicated the rest of her career to improving women’s health—from teaching prenatal care in Champaign, Illinois, to teaching menopause classes and managing an infertility clinic in Boston.

Recalling herself as a nursing student having to practice skills on her peers, Francis says the birthing suite will allow students to practice on manikins that can simulate human reactions.

“Maternity nursing has been my passion,” she says.

“Training a nurse is a lot more expensive than, perhaps, training a lawyer, but we need to prepare nurses for the tremendous variation of situations that they will face when they are practicing in the real world,” she says.

Because of that, Francis and her husband, Phil, former CEO of PetSmart, chose to make a $1 million gift to name the Nita & Phil Francis Family Birthing Suite, which is

IGNITE the UIC Nursing Annual Fund At UIC Nursing, we make sure to put gifts of all sizes— large and small—to good use. The Nursing Annual Fund is the college’s most useful and popular fund.

The collective force of hundreds of gifts made by alumni and friends each year makes a powerful impact on our faculty and students. All donations to the Annual Fund are unrestricted, making it a flexible source of funding for Dean Terri Weaver to direct to our most urgent needs.

• Renovation funding and equipment for teaching, learning and simulation spaces

Last fiscal year, your Nursing Annual Fund dollars supported many priorities, including:

• Supporting esteemed Nursing Collegiate Professors Ardith Doorenbos and Shannon Zenk

• NCLEX scholarships for students who needed help to pay the exam fee

All of this and more was possible because of each and every donor to the UIC College of Nursing Annual Fund.

• Supplements to scholarship and research awards across all campuses • Awards that honored outstanding graduating students Monica Luciano and Madeline Baxa.

• Matching student research funds for Jonas Scholars Sara Mithani and Susan Hovers

“Having the security of knowing my NCLEX is covered will give me more time and energy to put toward preparing for the exam itself, so that I can ensure I am successful in passing.”

Stormie Young, MS ’18, RN, speaking in spring 2018 as a recipient of funding from the Annual Fund to pay the fee to take the National Council Licensure Examination (NCLEX)

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 27

IMPACT

Focusing on what’s important

Jessica Lechuga left high school at age 17 when her baby girl was born. Now her daughter is her reason for returning to school, and scholarships make it possible. so she could breathe and a gastrostomy tube so she could eat. They showed her how to reinsert the G-tube if it came out and how to keep Abby’s nasal passages clear. They spoke to her as a doting mother, not a clueless teenager.

Lechuga knew then that she wanted to be a nurse, but it would take her years to pursue her dream. A single mom, she worked at a pharmacy and focused on her daughter’s needs. As Abby grew and her health began to stabilize, Lechuga again set her sights on becoming a nurse. She took a night class to get her GED and went to community college for her general education credits before getting accepted to UIC’s bachelor of science in nursing program in Chicago.

Jessica Lechuga and her daughter, Abby, now 12, study together in the UIC College of Nursing lobby.

When Jessica Lechuga, at age 17, had a baby with a rare and serious medical condition called CHARGE syndrome, it was the nurses who got her through the harrowing early days in the NICU. Nurses taught her how to care for her daughter, Abby, after a surgery at just 7 days old to put stents in her nose

Scholarships, including the Carolyn & Andy Dystrup Scholarship, made the difference in Lechuga’s first year at UIC. She was able to quit her pharmacy job and devote herself to school and her daughter. Now 12 and healthy, Abby walks to the College of Nursing from her elementary school next door to spend afternoons studying with her mom.

“I wanted to make sure to focus on nursing school and being a mom, and not overstretch myself with working, too,” Lechuga says. “I’m so grateful for these contributions to my education.”

“When I was teaching [nursing] at Joliet Junior College, we had many adult students who were working part time or full time to pay tuition.

I thought, ‘What a burden to have while you’re going through a nursing program.’ I created this scholarship fund to relieve some of the financial stress so students can follow through on their goals.”

Carolyn Dystrup, BSN ’70, MS, RN, whose endowed scholarship supported Jessica Lechuga as she entered the BSN program 28 |

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IMPACT

Honoring her mother

Seeing healthcare providers treat her parents like stereotypes of aging adults inspired Peggy Burhenn to help UIC nurses understand the realities of growing old.

Peggy Burhenn, MS ’86, BSN ’80, says she began to realize that healthcare providers need better training in caring for older adults as she watched her parents age. She found that clinicians made assumptions about their cognitive abilities and other aspects of their health.

As a clinical nurse specialist at City of Hope Medical Center in Duarte, California, Burhenn trains oncology nurses how to care for older adults.

“Cancer in a 40-year-old is different than cancer in an 80-year-old,” she says. “The 80-year-old might have different complications and other healthcare issues that affect their quality of life, not related to cancer.”

Healthcare professionals tend to know their area of specialty well, she says, but often have not gotten much education in the science of gerontology. Yet older adults will outnumber children in the U.S. for the first time in the country’s history by 2035, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

GOAL: $33M TO DATE: $23.3M

71%

Burhenn wants today’s nurses to get a strong foundation in caring for older adults, so she made a significant gift to the UIC College of Nursing to establish an endowed professorship with a focus on gerontology.

“I would like there to be a specific focus on geriatrics,” she says. “To have [more] faculty members who can really take the science of gerontology and try to help nurses understand the aging process, what happens and how this affects treatment options.”

“I would like there to be a specific focus on geriatrics— to have [more] faculty members who can really take the science of gerontology and try to help nurses understand the aging process, what happens and how this affects treatment options.”

The professorship will be named for Burhenn’s mother, Winifred A. Weber, who passed away in 2016 at age 93 and never had the opportunity to go to college. With another significant gift, Burhenn is also endowing a scholarship in her mother’s name.

“She would probably feel embarrassed to have something named after her, because she would feel like she wasn’t worthy,” Burhenn says. “She worked really hard to raise five kids with very few resources. I think she deserves to be credited.”

UIC Nursing’s progress toward IGNITE goal The college has raised $23.3 million toward an ambitious goal of $33 million as part of IGNITE: The Campaign for UIC. The campaign, a $750 million comprehensive fundraising initiative, publicly launched in fall 2017 and will run through 2022.

PROGRESS AS OF OCTOBER 2019

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 29

STUDENT SPOTLIGHT

MS student helps lead interprofessional team to a win Consider this real-world question: How do you solve the problem of an encampment of more than 300 homeless individuals in south Minneapolis who are experiencing an increasing number of healthcare emergencies?

That was the dilemma put before Jennifer Neely, a nursing student in the graduate-entry master’s degree program. Luckily, she didn’t have to try to solve it alone.

Neely was part of a group of four UIC students from across healthcare disciplines who worked on a recommended solution as part of the 2019 CLARION National Interprofessional Case Competition, hosted by the University of Minnesota’s CLARION board.

Neely and her group, the IHI (Institute for Healthcare Improvement) UIC Open School chapter team, placed first in the competition on April 13, 2019, with a proposal based on two proven models: Street Medicine, the practice of providing on-site care in the camp, and Housing First, providing housing and ongoing care. They got support from co-faculty advisors Marianne Durham, DNP, RN, CPPS, UIC Nursing clinical assistant professor, and Frank Borgers, UIC School of Public Health clinical assistant professor.

Neely, left, poses with her team at the 2019 CLARION National Interprofessional Case Competition.

When asked what she learned from the experience, Neely says, “Working in silos will not solve big problems; only broad, dedicated, equitable teams can even get close.”

BSN student wins first place in MNRS research competitions Brooklyn Hastings, who graduated with her BSN in May 2019, was honored last spring with two big awards for her research on quality of life among sickle cell disease patients who have received stem cell transplants.

At the Midwest Nursing Research Society conference in late March, she won first place among bachelor’s degree students in a poster competition. She also won the best student paper award, which meant her manuscript was published in August by the Western Journal of Nursing Research. That award also comes with $500 from Sage Publishing.

Her mentors were Crystal Patil, PhD, associate professor and head of the Department of Women, Children and Family Health Science, and Agatha Gallo, PhD, RN, FAAN, professor emerita.

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Hastings poses with her poster at the MNRS conference in Kansas City, Missouri.

EXPERT VIEWPOINT

Hope for heart patients Associate professor Susan Dunn, PhD, RN, FAHA, FAAN, has spent most of her career focused on the care of adults with heart disease. Most concerning to her have been patients who express defeatist negativity about their recovery—a condition known as hopelessness.

Working in a cardiac rehabilitation facility, I saw a 60-year-old patient—let’s call him Mr. Jeluso—who had recently had a heart attack and coronary artery stent placement. Mr. Jeluso was obese, lived a sedentary lifestyle and had been referred to the cardiac rehab exercise program. Yet, he chose not to attend, making comments such as, “I’m sure exercise won’t help,” “I’m doomed to die of heart disease,” and, “It is out of my hands.”

Based on my years of clinical experience and research, I didn’t believe that he was suffering from depression.

Depression often occurs as a grief response to the past, and includes symptoms of depressed mood or sadness, apathy, loss of interest in usual activities, and changes in appetite, energy level or sleep. Mr. Jeluso wasn’t exhibiting those symptoms.

Instead, I believed Mr. Jeluso was suffering from hopelessness.

Hopelessness is present in 27% to 52% of heart patients, which is a very concerning statistic. Other researchers have found hopelessness to be highly predictive of death in heart patients, independent of depression. Hopelessness is associated with a three times increased risk of death.

decreases over time. Hopelessness does not decrease in heart patients; instead it persists.

In my research, the one thing that I found to improve hopelessness is exercise. Patients who exercise after their heart event have significantly lower hopelessness levels. In a pilot study of patients with moderate to severe hopelessness, we found that patients increased their physical activity level after a nurse-led intervention that included a motivational interviewing session and six weeks of motivational text messages. We’re now expanding that pilot to a five-year, $2.4 million NIH-funded study of 225 patients.

As practicing nurses, we need to be assessing patients for hopelessness. My State-Trait Hopelessness Scale (used to differentiate a temporary response to a new event versus a patient’s habitual outlook on life) is being used in eight countries and readily available for both practitioners and researchers. If you have a patient who is exhibiting hopelessness symptoms, encourage them to be more physically active, even at home or in their community. This could mean walking more around their house, in their neighborhood or at a mall, or joining an exercise group or gym.

There is confusion about the difference between depression and hopelessness. Hopelessness is negative feelings and expectations about the future and also a sense of helplessness in being able to change one’s future. People who are depressed can be hopeless, yet hopelessness often stands alone.

My research has focused on individuals with heart disease, but hopelessness has been identified by other researchers in patients with cancer, HIV/AIDS and stroke.

My hope is that my intervention could be appropriate for any patient who has chronic illness, because we know physical activity can improve hopelessness and overall health and recovery.

The problem is that we are doing very little to try to decrease or prevent hopelessness. Antidepressants are primarily ineffective in treating hopelessness. In the patients I have examined in my research, depression

Dunn joined the Department of Biobehavioral Health Science in 2018. To learn more about her State-Trait Hopelessness Scale, contact her at sdunn01@uic.edu.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 31

RESEARCH ROUND-UP

Not worth the wait People should heed heart attack symptoms promptly whether they’re gradual or abrupt.

Patients with gradual heart attack symptoms take longer to seek help than those with more abrupt symptoms—and those delays could prove life-threatening.

Gradual symptoms refer to mild discomfort that slowly gets worse, while abrupt refers to sudden and severe pain from the start. Mirzaei said that chest pain, chest discomfort and chest pressure are warning signs that an artery may be blocked and patients should call for emergency medical services immediately.

That’s according to a study

by Sahereh Mirzaei, PhD ’19, and co-authored by five UIC Nursing faculty members, which was published in the European Journal of Cardiovascular Nursing on Sept. 12, 2019.

“Our study shows that gradual symptoms are not taken seriously.”

Looking at data from 474 heart attack patients seen at U.S. emergency departments, the researchers found those with gradual symptoms waited eight hours to seek medical help, while those with abrupt symptoms waited an average of 2.6 hours. Delays of more than two hours are more likely to result in serious complications or death.

“Both are a medical emergency and require urgent help,” Mirzaei says. “But our study shows that gradual symptoms are not taken seriously.”

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—Sahereh Mirzaei Co-authors included the following UIC Nursing faculty: Alana Steffen, research assistant professor and senior biostatistician, Karen Vuckovic, PhD ’13, APRN, ACNS-BC, clinical assistant professor, Catherine Ryan, PhD, RN, CCRN, FAHA, clinical associate professor, Ulf Bronas, PhD, ATC, ATR, FSVM, FAHA, associate professor, and Holli DeVon, PhD ’02, MS ’82, RN, FAHA, FAAN, professor emerita.

RESEARCH ROUND-UP

Interdisciplinary enrichment

At the UIC College of Nursing, some of our most celebrated research faculty come from disciplines other than nursing. That’s because we know that other disciplines can overlap, intersect and inform nursing education and research in important ways. Here we highlight three faculty members who are not nurses, looking at how they ended up at UIC Nursing and how their areas of study advance the field of nursing.

PHOENIX MATTHEWS

JULIENNE RUTHERFORD

CRYSTAL PATIL

Helen K. Grace Diversity Scholar and professor in the Department of Health Systems Science

Associate professor and associate head of the Department of Women, Children and Family Health Science

Professor and head of the Department of Women, Children and Family Health Science

PHD IS IN...

Clinical psychology, State University of New York at Binghamton

PHD IS IN...

Biological anthropology, Indiana University

PHD IS IN...

Biological anthropology, The Ohio State University

AREA OF EXPERTISE Cancer-related health disparities with a focus on racial and ethnic minorities and other underserved populations, specifically as a result of tobacco use

The long-term effects of the fetal period on human and nonhuman primate development, with a focus on the placenta

Reproductive ecology and evidence-based strategies to reduce health inequities globally among women and children

H O W D I D YO U L A N D AT T H E U I C C O L L EG E O F N U R S I N G ?

“I completed a postdoctoral fellowship at UIC focused on cancer inequity research and felt strongly aligned with the social justice emphasis of many nursing faculty. My mentor, professor emerita Tonda Hughes, strongly encouraged me to apply to a position here.

It’s been my academic home since 2003.”

“I first came to UIC as a tenure-track faculty member in the College of Dentistry, but found nursing was a better fit because of the strong midwifery and women’s health program here.”

“When a nursing PhD student joined my maternal health project in Tanzania, I learned about my overlapping interests with College of Nursing faculty. Since joining the faculty here in 2014, we’ve initiated several midwifery-driven and HIV prevention projects.”

INTERSECTION WITH NURSING SCIENCE “The majority of UIC Nursing faculty are focused on community based or healthequity research. I believe the theories, methods and competencies required to conduct rigorous research in nursing and psychology are complementary and synergistic. I draw from and teach best practices from both disciplines.”

“By looking at similarities and differences between primates, I help students appreciate the ancient physiology that guides pregnancy and birth. Looking at animal models is also a powerful model for understanding health disparities in humans.”

“Systems change requires multiple perspectives to be successful, so I work with nurses, doctors, public health workers, social workers and other social scientists to develop innovative change to improve quality of care and support patient-centered approaches.”

NEWSWORTHY Matthews’ work led to restrictions on the sale of menthol-flavored tobacco in Chicago. More recently, Matthews’ advocacy work helped lead to a statewide law requiring public buildings to have gender-neutral bathrooms.

Rutherford is a co-investigator on a $2 million Department of Defense grant to study the effectiveness of a vaccine to fight the Zika virus in the marmoset monkey. What they learn could help combat Zika in humans.

Patil is primary investigator on a five-year, $3.1 million NIH grant to study whether group prenatal care, as opposed to individual care, could be the key to curbing the world’s highest rates of maternal mortality in sub-Saharan Africa.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 33

RESEARCH ROUND-UP

To tell or not to tell

A UIC Nursing-led longitudinal study tracked whether parents followed through on intentions to tell their children they were the product of egg donors.

When UIC Nursing associate professor Patricia Hershberger, PhD ’05, RN, FNP, FAAN, interviewed pregnant moms who had used egg donors about whether they planned to tell their children of their origins, most said they intended to tell or were undecided. Only one of seven was confirmed against it.

That was back in 2004. Twelve years later, Hershberger followed up with the families, and was surprised to find that only one couple had made the revelation.

The findings were published online in the journal Human Fertility in February 2019. Her co-authors are Martha Driessnack of Oregon Health & Science University, Karen Kavanaugh of Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin and Susan Klock of Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

The results were surprising, the study’s authors wrote, “in view of the growing trend toward openness.”

Parents gave a variety of reasons for not disclosing, including: not knowing how to tell their children, concerns about how their children would react, questions about how it would affect the parent-child relationship, and continued struggles with the grief of infertility.

Hershberger says future research could focus on resources to help parents make these decisions and, for those who want to disclose, how to tell their children, which may grow in importance given the ubiquity of direct-to-consumer genetic testing.

Shining a spotlight on bisexual health

Despite making up the largest proportion of the lesbian, gay and bisexual population, bisexual individuals’ unique health needs are rarely studied.

UIC College of Nursing associate professor Wendy Bostwick, PhD, MPH, co-edited a special section on bisexual health research in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, the first time the prominent sexuality journal has dedicated an entire section to the health of bisexual people.

Bostwick served as guest editor with Brian Dodge, associate director of the Center for Sexual Health Promotion at the Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington, for the special section, which was published in January 34 |

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2019. Bostwick’s line of research is focused on health disparities among sexual- and gender-minority populations.

Such scholarship is important because bisexual people consistently report higher rates of negative health outcomes, including mood and anxiety disorders, substance abuse, suicide, and disparities related to healthcare access and use, they wrote.

The section, “Can You See Us Now?” consisted of more than a dozen contributions from researchers across the globe, focusing on issues such as aging among bisexual people, sexual identity and depression, how discrimination affects health and well-being, and new measures for capturing the experiences of bisexual people.

UIC Nursing AROUND THE STATE QUAD CITIES, PEORIA, ROCKFORD, SPRINGFIELD, URBANA

In-state tuition offered to DNP students in neighboring states Students who live in Wisconsin, Iowa, Indiana, Missouri or Kentucky and who are enrolled in the doctor of nursing practice program at UIC’s Quad Cities, Peoria, Rockford, Springfield or Urbana campuses will pay the Illinois in-state tuition rate thanks to a change approved by the University of Illinois Board of Trustees.

Currently, that is a discount of $6,359 from the out-of-state rate. The change will apply to both new and continuing students.

Previously, there was only reciprocity for DNP students in Iowa attending the Quad Cities campus.

URBANA

Spotlight: Jennifer Sedlock As an AirLife flight nurse, Jennifer Sedlock, BSN ’04, DNP ’19, has an unpredictable, exciting and sometimes dramatic job. She was featured in Urbana’s News-Gazette in May 2019 for her role in a miraculous highway rescue.

But with her DNP in hand, she’s ready to make a “180-degree” change.

V.S. You’ve been a flight nurse for 13 years. What do you like about it?

J.S. It is something very outside-the-box as far as nursing goes. What I love about it is that it’s very unpredictable.

Whenever I show up to work, I never know how my day is going to go. We could have five flights; we could have no flights. Every flight is an emergency, and we have to be ready to go 24-7.

V.S. Why did you want to get your DNP at UIC? J.S. I always knew I wanted to go back to school, but I wanted to feel confident enough in my assessment skills and my knowledge base to go back. I felt I had a solid foundation when I hit my 10-year mark of being out of school and practicing nursing. Choosing UIC was just a natural choice for me. I went there for my BSN. It was a great program and prepared me well.

V.S. What are you doing next?

J.S. I’m doing almost a 180-degree turn. I’m going into adult gerontology primary care, and I’ll be working as a nurse practitioner at Carle Foundation Hospital with GI patients. I’ve never had the opportunity to build a relationship with a patient and follow him or her through.

I’m looking forward to being a patient’s provider for years—learning their story and building a relationship with them—instead of seeing them in snapshot in time.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 35

AROUND THE STATE

ROCKFORD/QUAD CITIES

PEORIA

Spotlight: Debbie Simon After graduating from UIC Nursing, Debbie Simon, BSN ’76, accepted a job as a nurse at Methodist Hospital in Peoria.

She rose through the ranks to eventually serve as its regional chief executive officer and continued to lead after its merger with UnityPoint Health.

She retired in 2019 after a 43-year career with UnityPoint.

Congresswoman’s visit focuses on rural health UIC College of Nursing faculty touted their work preparing nurses to practice in rural areas when U.S. Rep. Cheri Bustos visited the college’s Quad Cities campus in June 2019.

V.S. What made you want to pursue a career in leadership?

D.S. I was asked to be the manager of a nursing unit after just a couple years of practicing. I found I loved the opportunity to bring the team together and to look for better ways to organize and care for patients. I enjoyed working with other disciplines to assure quality care was provided on the unit.

V.S. How did your background as a nurse inform your leadership skills and style?

D.S. As a nurse, you learn a great deal from your patients about human behavior. I enjoyed learning from my patients what motivated them about their health, and that transferred to working with staff on what motivates them. I also had a very well-rounded education from UIC Nursing. It prepared me to work with many different situations and to handle complex issues and conditions.

All this applies to leading a team delivering patient care.

V.S. What are you most proud of in your career?

D.S. I can’t name just one. Two areas of great pride are building an executive team of value-based leaders and leading a nursing team who believed in excellence and providing great care. We became the first hospital in downstate Illinois to receive Magnet Recognition from the American Nurses Credentialing Center.

V.S. What’s your fondest memory from getting your degree at UIC? D.S. All the friends, faculty and colleagues I met.

They taught me so much about being a nurse and also about life.

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Bustos met with Quad Cities campus director Kathleen Sparbel, PhD, MS ’96, FNP-BC, and Rockford campus director Kelly Rosenberger, DNP ’12, CNM, WHNP-BC, FAANP, to learn about UIC Nursing’s commitment to train advanced practice nurses to work in rural areas, notably through the college’s rural nursing concentration, known as RNURSING. In turn, Bustos shared her advocacy and legislative efforts to strengthen high quality healthcare in rural areas.

About 20% to 30% of Illinois residents live in areas where there’s a shortage of primary care providers based on federal standards. This has resulted in health disparities in rural areas, such as higher incidence of disease and disability, higher mortality, and lower life expectancies, says Rosenberger, who leads the RNURSING concentration.

Bustos’ congressional district encompasses three UIC Nursing campuses: Peoria, Quad Cities and Rockford.

Rep. Bustos, center, toured the Quad Cities campus and met with DNP student Mike Tapia, left, and recent graduate Melissa Bradley, DNP ’19.

AROUND THE STATE

ROCKFORD

Spotlight: Tombi Smith

DNP student Abby Shumate, right, is pictured in Haiti with a student from another school.

QUAD CITIES

Students share global experience Three Quad Cities DNP students, Abby Shumate, Cheryl Ehler, DNP ’19, and Cara Voelliger, DNP ’19, shared their experiences working at a Haitian health clinic near the capital city of Port-au-Prince during the Career Development Fair & Preceptor Recognition Program in February 2019. Also at the event, students had the opportunity to meet with potential employers, and nearly 20 clinical preceptors were recognized.

Less than two weeks after graduating with her DNP in 2017, Tombi Smith had her eighth child. She calls her children and husband her “cheering squad,” supporting her with every step forward in her nursing career. After taking some time off to take her certification exam to become a family nurse practitioner and to stay home with her newest child, she started her job at SwedishAmerican Immediate Care in September 2018.

V.S. Tell us about your path to becoming a nurse?

T.S. When we moved to Rockford for my husband’s job in 2006, I was a stay-at-home mother with three children.

I had previously worked as a CNA and knew I wanted to further my healthcare career, but the timing was not great. I guess I decided, the heck with timing, because I woke up one morning and told my husband I was enrolling in classes for nursing school. I graduated with my associate’s degree in 2009 and my BSN in 2012.

V.S. What made you want to get your DNP at UIC?

QUAD QUAD CITIES CITIES

Two scholarships honor key contributors The UIC Nursing-Quad Cities campus is honored to announce the Lynn E. Kustes Nursing Scholarship, established in May 2019 with a $25,000 gift from John Kustes as a tribute to his late wife. For decades, Lynn Kustes, BSN ’82, was an actively involved alumna in the Quad Cities. She passed away in September 2017.

Another fund to support scholarships in the Quad Cities was fully endowed in 2019 by donations from the campus’s faculty, staff and previous directors.

It is in memory of the late Jeanne Gittings, longtime Trinity Medical Center (now Unity Point-Trinity) medical librarian who provided substantial library support to UIC Nursing-Quad Cities students and faculty. The scholarship ‘s first recipient is DNP student Kelli Pool.

T.S. After getting my BSN, I was working in critical care and the emergency room. I enjoyed both fields, but I wanted a stronger hand in making decisions and solving healthcare puzzles for my patients. I chose to apply to UIC because of its stellar achievements in nursing and the ability to connect with my professors in Rockford.

V.S. How did UIC Nursing prepare you for your current role?

T.S. I currently work as an immediate care provider and love every minute of it. It is super busy and my patients’ complaints are always a surprise. It’s a new puzzle each and every time for me. UIC uses a team-based model to get you to think of the many differentials that come with the symptoms for each patient. That model helps you explore outcomes and prepares you for real situations.

Kustes’ gift and gifts to the Gittings scholarship help the College of Nursing move toward its goal for IGNITE: The Campaign for UIC. VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 37

AROUND THE STATE

QUAD CITIES

Spotlight: Jennifer Junis Jennifer Junis, MS ’12, BSN ’01, recently took on a new role as senior vice president of OSF Saint Gabriel Digital Health, an initiative of Peoria-based OSF HealthCare to expand access to care via technology. Junis is a longtime leader within OSF, most recently serving as president of OSF HealthCare St. Mary Medical Center in Galesburg.

V.S. What drew you to a job in digital healthcare delivery?

J.J. I believe everyone deserves high-quality healthcare no matter where they live or how much money they make.

I know that technology can be a great equalizer, and we can leverage it to extend our expert and specialty care to everyone. Using that prism, it’s clear we have to look for innovative solutions.

V.S. Tell us about your new role.

J.J. As senior vice president, I am the strategic and operations leader of virtual, on-demand and retail services such as OSF Urgo, a new concept for urgent care, and OSF OnCall, virtual visits with a provider. I am part of a team coordinating digitally delivered services to our patients, allowing care teams to virtually monitor patients at home, specifically those who are at risk for complications and hospital readmission.

V.S. How does being a nurse inform your leadership style?

J.J. As a nurse who has worked in many rural hospitals, I understand the mindset and challenges facing patients, their caregivers and their families. I know the importance of listening. For patients and families, the need to be heard and understood is primary. From my experience, I know whatever technology we use has to be easy and will likely build on what’s already familiar to our older patients, such as iPhones and at-home assistants like Alexa. I realize technology can’t replace face-to-face communication and hands-on care, but it can support it at times when there is a barrier to immediate access. Additionally, technology offers new options for more ongoing contact to keep patients engaged in their own healthcare.

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SPRINGFIELD

Scene of DCFS Training The Springfield campus played host to Department of Children and Family Services staff during a training in August 2019, allowing DCFS to use its emergency department sim lab and classroom to create a simulated child maltreatment investigation. The event got coverage from the Associated Press and local TV stations.

PEORIA

Peoria campus director looks back After four years as director of the Peoria campus, Elaine Hardy, PhD ’11, RN, stepped down in May 2019.

Vital Signs asked her to reflect on her years leading the college’s third-oldest campus.

“Looking back on my time as director, I feel most proud when I think of the journeys our students begin when they become alumni of UIC Nursing-Peoria,” says Hardy. “I am honored to have been able to get to know the students and their families and to have touched their lives in a positive and lasting way. And I’m grateful to [administrative assistant] Scotti Nieukirk and the faculty for being my partners every step of the way.”

Hardy remains on faculty as clinical assistant professor at the Peoria campus. Kathleen Sparbel, PhD, MS ’96, FNP-BC, director of UIC Nursing’s Quad Cities campus, is serving as interim director in Peoria.

The UIC College of Nursing is seeking to expand our Alumni Board, with particular interest in adding more alumni from our campuses beyond Chicago. If you graduated from our Peoria, Quad Cities, Rockford, Springfield or Urbana campus and are interested in serving your alma mater in this way, please contact Sara Almassian, associate director of alumni engagement and participation, at salmas1@uic.edu or (312) 996-2315.

AROUND THE STATE

URBANA

Students drive rural health project A $3,900 grant from the Illinois Nurses Foundation, via the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, is allowing Urbana faculty and students to work with the Vermilion County Health Department on three targeted rural health priorities: emergency preparedness, mental health stigma and pregnancy/STD prevention. The rural county east of Urbana-Champaign is ranked last of Illinois’ 102 counties in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s County Health Rankings.

Students are driving the grant, says principal investigator and Urbana campus director Krista Jones, DNP ’11, MSN ’07, PHNA-BC, RN. They are distributing a mental health survey to area providers, educating the community on the stigma associated with mental illness and promoting referrals with a mental health brochure, a radio ad and newspaper editorials. They are also creating an educational video on teen pregnancy prevention geared toward male responsibility and developing male empowerment videos, shared with young men in community programs In fall 2019, students are planning to create an emergency preparedness survey to evaluate the community’s level of readiness for crisis situations.

URBANA

Jones appointed to nursing workforce board Urbana campus director Krista Jones was appointed to the 10-member Illinois Nursing Workforce Center Advisory Board.

The center seeks to produce more highly skilled nursing professionals to meet the healthcare needs in Illinois. The advisory board is tasked with developing a strategic plan for nursing manpower in Illinois, maintaining a database on Illinois nursing supply and demand, selecting priority issues, convening stakeholders, promoting nurses, and identifying funding.

SPRINGFIELD

Spotlight: Guadalupe Niño Guadalupe Niño, BSN ’19, RN, always imagined herself attending college and practicing nursing in her home city of Chicago. Instead, she followed her passion to Springfield, where she discovered a new home.

V.S. What drew you to nursing?

G.N. When I was around 8 years old, my only living grandmother was diagnosed with cancer. After finding out that my grandmother was so sick, my family moved from Chicago to Mexico to take care of her. My brother and I were involved in the care of our grandma until her condition became more severe. After she passed away, we moved back to Chicago, where my parents would take me to their medical appointments to translate. The communication barrier made the healthcare system frightening, but the nurses were always a calming presence to me. They helped me build a bridge for my family to the healthcare system. I knew I wanted to be that bridge for others.

V.S. What was your transition to Springfield like?

G.N. It was difficult at first. I always thought I would pursue the goal of becoming a nurse while being in Chicago and having my family with me every step of the way. While I was thrilled to have been accepted into the UIC College of Nursing, I didn’t know anyone else who would be attending the Springfield campus. My family describes me as a very determined, goal-oriented and passionate person. They reminded me of my goal and of their continuous support. My classmates who are Springfield natives were very welcoming. They would take us out to experience the great things Springfield had to offer. Over two years, the whole class grew closer as a cohort. We all became a big family.

V.S. What are you doing now?

G.N. After personally experiencing the support that Memorial Medical Center offers to its staff, I decided to accept a position in Springfield as a circulating nurse in the main operating room. Memorial will help me establish a strong foundation with endless opportunities for growth.

Niño was a 2018-19 recipient of the Memorial Health System scholarship.

VITAL SIGNS FALL 2019 | 39

LookingBack

Old-school simulation Simulation has long been a part of nursing education, but this undated photo from the UIC Nursing archives shows just how far we’ve come. In the newly-opened M. Christine Schwartz Experiential Learning & Simulation Laboratory, students in 2019 still learn about human physiology, but instead of working with inanimate dummies, now they can experience vital signs and other realistic bodily functions on high-fidelity manikins, watch videos with 3D renderings, and practice skills in realistic hospital rooms. It makes us wonder what the next 50 years will bring.

Editor’s note: We believe this photo to be taken circa 1970, but we’d love to hear from alumni who recognize the individuals in the photo or know what year it is from. Please direct tips to Deborah Ziff Soriano at dsoriano@uic.edu or (312) 355-8685.

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College of Nursing

Take the road best traveled The DNP at UIC • Ranked #3 among public universities in the U.S. (U.S. News & World Report) • World-renowned excellence in 12 focus areas, with post-master’s non-specialty option also available • Flexible format: hybrid of online and on-site courses

LINDA L. FAHEY UIC DNP ’12 Chief Operating Officer Decatur Memorial Hospital

• Highly-desirable clinical placements arranged for you • Post-DNP certificate available for APRNs to add or change focus areas • #1 among Illinois nursing schools for NIH research funding Learn more at go.uic.edu/DNP-VS

Chicago | Peoria | Quad Cities Rockford | Springfield | Urbana

Save the date

The University of Illinois at Chicago 845 S Damen Ave, MC 802 Chicago, IL 60612

2020 All-Alumni REUNION Saturday, October 10, 2020 • Chicago Campus

Make sure we have your full contact information by visiting go.uic.edu/NursingAlumUpdate