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Leadership in Action: Alumni, Faculty, Staff and Student Milestones

Society of Critical Care Medicine Issues Guidelines for Family-Centered Care in the ICU

UC San Francisco School of Nursing’s Linda Franck and Kathleen Puntillo were among six nurses who served on a 29-member multidisciplinary panel of international experts that developed a new set of guidelines for promoting family-centered care in neonatal, pediatric and adult intensive care units (ICUs). The Society of Critical Care Medicine presented the new guidelines at the 46th Critical Care Congress in January 2017; they were published in the January 2017 issue of Critical Care Medicine and are also available at ICULiberation.org.

Linda Franck (left) and Kathleen Puntillo Franck provided her expertise on support for families of pediatric and neonatal critical care patients – and recently spoke on this topic to KCBS radio – and Puntillo provided her expertise on family support for critically ill adults.

Based on the panel’s analysis of more than 450 studies on ICU care, the guidelines identify the evidence base for family-centered care in the ICU and provide five detailed recommendations on best practices for hospitals and ICU clinicians and staff. The presentation also highlighted areas for further research.

New Nursing Leadership at San Francisco VA Center of Excellence in Primary Care Education

From left: Anna Strewler, Krista Gager, Terry Keene UC San Francisco School of Nursing faculty member Anna Strewler is the new nurse practitioner (NP) co-director of the San Francisco VA Center of Excellence in Primary Care Education (CoEPCE), and School faculty member Krista Gager is the new associate co-director. Strewler and Gager are 2014 graduates of the School’s Adult-Gerontology Primary Care Nurse Practitioner Program and completed primary care NP residencies at the CoEPCE in 2015.

Strewler replaces School faculty member Terry Keene, who has served as co-director since 2013 but is stepping down to take a new leadership role as chief of advanced practice nursing at the San Francisco VA Medical Center.

Midwifery Student Darcy Stanley Featured in EastBay Today

Nicole Sata (far left) and Darcy Stanley (third from left) open a training session for prospective doulas. Darcy Stanley, a student in the UC San Francisco School of Nursing Certified Nurse-Midwife/Women’s Health Nurse Practitioner Program, is featured in the January 6, 2017, issue of EastBay Today (a publication of California State University, East Bay) for her work with the Birth Justice Project.

Stanley, a 2014 graduate of Cal State East Bay’s nursing program, co-founded the project with certified nurse-midwife and women’s health nurse practitioner Nicole Sata (MS ’16) in 2011, when both were working as doulas (assistants who provide nonclinical support to laboring women). Birth Justice volunteers provide doula care and health education to incarcerated women in the San Francisco County and Santa Rita jails, and through Bay Area residential addiction recovery programs.

Birth Justice is also part of the East Bay Community Birth Support Project, in collaboration with UCSF and Oakland-based Black Women Birthing Justice, a collective that provides doula training for formerly incarcerated and low-income women of color.

Libby Smith Featured on Cigarette Filters in Natur

Libby Smith In the January issue of the German-language journal Natur, Professor of Social & Behavioral Sciences Elizabeth (Libby) Smith argues against the idea of using biodegradable cigarette filters to combat the pollution caused by single-use filters.

Smith, whose research focuses on tobacco control policy and the tobacco industry, notes that studies have shown that biodegradable cigarette filters could exacerbate the pollution problem (they still release toxins into the environment and may encourage smokers to discard butts outside of appropriate receptacles). A better solution, she argues, would be a ban on single-use cigarette filters.

New York Times Features Charlene Harrington on New Nursing Home Regulations

Charlene Harrington Charlene Harrington, professor emerita of Social & Behavioral Sciences, was among the national experts on nursing home quality featured in a January 27 New York Times column on “The New Old Age.”

In the column, which discusses the September 2016 revisions the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) made to its regulations on long-term care facilities, Harrington expressed disappointment that CMS didn’t set minimum standards for staff ratios or require 24-hour registered nurse (RN) care in the new rules.

Harrington’s work to improve nursing home quality has spanned more than three decades, and she has long been a champion of industry transparency and meaningful oversight, including mandatory staffing levels, which her research has shown to be a key contributor to safety. She has served on several Institute of Medicine committees on nursing home quality and regulation, and helped develop Medicare’s Nursing Home Compare tool, which provides information for consumers on nursing home quality of care and staffing.

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