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

Nursing Leaders

Sept. 17, 2018

By Diana Austin

Joanne Spetz and Ulrike Muench in Health Affairs on NPs and Primary Care Gap

Joanne Spetz, professor at the Institute for Health Policy Studies and associate director for research at UCSF’s Healthforce Center, and Ulrike Muench, assistant professor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, published an article, “California Nurse Practitioners Are Positioned to Fill the Primary Care Gap, but They Face Barriers to Practice,” in the September issue of Health Affairs.

The article reports findings from a survey of California NPs that explored barriers to NP practice in the state. The authors recommend “expanding education programs in underserved areas, increasing the diversity of the nurse practitioner workforce, and ensuring that nurse practitioners feel empowered to fully use their skills” in order to meet the state’s primary care needs.

Spetz has also published a report for the Healthforce Center examining nurse practitioner scope-of-practice laws and how they affect patient care in California. The report is part of a series published by the Healthforce Center that examines the scope of practice of selected health professions in California.

Faculty Publish Evaluation of San Francisco Support at Home Program

Joanne Spetz and her colleagues Laura Wagner, associate professor of Community Health Systems and Susan Chapman, professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences, along with Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies research analysts Jacqueline Miller and Timothy Bates, have also published a report for the Healthforce Center, evaluating the first year of the San Francisco Support at Home Program, which provides financial support for the purchase of home care services by adults with disabilities and older adults in San Francisco.

Lisa Schwartz and Teresa Scherzer Receive 2018 Chancellor Awards for Diversity

School of Nursing student Lisa Schwartz and Academic Programs Evaluator Teresa Scherzer are recipients of Chancellor Awards for Diversity for 2018.

Chancellor Awards for Diversity recognize the outstanding efforts of individuals who demonstrate a strong dedication to diversity. Individuals recognized are leaders and pioneers in their respective fields and to the communities in which they serve.

Schwartz was recognized in the category of Disability Service. In presenting the award, Director of Student Disability Services Tim Montgomery and Professor of Family and Community Medicine Clarissa Kripke said, “[Lisa] went the extra mile to ensure that the syllabus and curriculum was also designed to be as accessible as possible to learners with disabilities.”

Scherzer was recognized in the category of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Leadership. “[Teresa] models cultural humility, questioning her own unconscious biases and challenging herself and others to look deeply at the processes and structural barriers that are frequently taken for granted and which contribute to alienating, exclusionary and often painful experiences for under-represented members of our community,” said Clinical Professor Erica Monasterio, former director of the Family Nurse Practitioner program.

Silvia Arabia Receives United Health Foundation Diverse Scholars Initiative Award

Silvia Arabia Master’s Entry Program in Nursing (MEPN) student Silvia Arabia was recognized with a United Health Foundation Diverse Scholars Initiative award at the recent National Association of Hispanic Nurses (NAHN) annual meeting in Cleveland, Ohio.

The United Health Foundation Diverse Scholars Initiative works to increase the number of primary care health providers ready to meet health care needs now and in the future by creating a more culturally relevant health workforce and a more effective health care system, particularly in underserved communities. NAHN values its partnership with the United Health Foundation, which provides a scholarship of $5,000 per year for three consecutive years.

Silvia will enter the Nurse-Midwife/Women’s Health Nurse Practitioner program after her MEPN year.

Laura Wagner Is Inaugural Silvestri Endowed Lecturer, Dines with UC President

Laura Wagner Laura Wagner, associate professor of Community Health Systems, was the inaugural Silvestri Endowed Lecture Speaker at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas School of Nursing on August 2, 2018.

Wagner was also among 11 UC-wide faculty who attended an August 28 dinner with UC President Janet Napolitano and UC Provost Michael Brown. Wagner was there to speak about her work with UCSF First Generation Support Services, a group that works with UCSF students who are first-generation college students and, according to its website, “strive[s] to create a campus environment in which the dreams of our academic pioneers and the collective vision for equal educational opportunity can be realized, regardless of socioeconomic class.”

Barbara Koenig in Fortune on Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing

Barbara Koenig, director of the UCSF Bioethics Program, is the featured expert in a Fortune video on things consumers should know before taking a home genetics test. In the video, she cautions viewers to consider several factors, including uncertain regulation and legal protections, data and privacy concerns, and the complexities of interpreting results and what they mean for individual health.

Jason Flatt in U.S. News & World Report on Dementia in LGBT Seniors

Jason Flatt A study by Jason Flatt, assistant professor in the Institute for Health & Aging, was the focus of a recent article in U.S. News & World Report. The study, which Flatt presented at the 2018 Alzheimer’s Association International Conference in Chicago in July, is the first to examine the prevalence of dementia among a large population of LGBT seniors aged 60 and older. You can view his press briefing on the paper on YouTube.

Adele Clarke Edits New Book

Adele Clarke Sociologist Adele Clarke, professor emerita of Social and Behavioral Sciences, and Donna Haraway – a noted feminist scholar in science and technology studies – edited Making Kin Not Population: Reconceiving Generations, which was recently published by the University of Chicago Press. The book’s contributors, a selection of leading antiracist, ecologically concerned, feminist scholars, provide bold analyses of complex issues of intimacy and kinship, from reproductive justice to environmental justice, and from human and nonhuman genocides to new practices for making families and kin.

Barbara Burgel Appointed to California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board

Barbara Burgel California Governor Edmund Brown Jr. has appointed Professor Emerita Barbara Burgel to the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board. Burgel, who retired in 2017, taught in the School for 36 years, in both the Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing (OEHN) and the Adult-Gerontology Primary Care Nurse Practitioner (AGPCNP) specialties. She co-led the UCSF Community Occupational Health Project and served on the board of directors for the American Board for Occupational Health Nurses.

Investing in the Future of Healthcare-Generative Incubator to Develop Nurse Leaders

Monica R. McLemore (fourth from right) and the first Generative Incubator participants In August 2018, under the leadership of Monica R. McLemore – and in partnership with Associate Professor and midwifery specialty Director Kim Dau and Kimberly Baltzell, associate professor and director of the Center for Global Health in the School of Nursing – nine nursing and public health clinicians, students and scholars from around the country participated in the first Generative Incubator to develop media, advocacy and leadership skills.

The Generative Incubator – co-sponsored by Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health (ANSIRH), the UCSF School of Nursing and the Scholars Strategy Network – provided intensive content for three days, in addition to opportunities for networking, strategizing and deep thinking about how to maximize nursing voices in public media, and is part of McLemore’s newly funded work to develop pre- and postdoctoral scholars and other learners in creating programs of research in reproductive justice.

Brianna Singleton Receives SAMHSA Minority Fellowship

Brianna Singleton 2016 Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing program (AGPCNP-OEHN) graduate and Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing PhD degree candidate Brianna Singleton has been awarded a 2018-2019 fellowship from the National Advisory Committee of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA)’s Minority Fellowship Program at the American Nurses Association.

Debra Hemmerle Presents on Brain Injury and Return to Work

Debra Hemmerle Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing PhD degree student Debra Hemmerle presented her study, “Return to Work After Mild Traumatic Brain Injury: Transforming Research and Clinical Knowledge in Traumatic Brain Injury (TRACK-TBI) Study,” at the 2018 International NeuroTrauma Conference in Toronto, Canada.

Sandra Domeracki Authors Article on Occupational Tennis Leg

Sandra Domeracki Assistant Professor of Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing Sandra (Sandy) Domeracki has authored an article, “Off the Courts: Occupational ‘Tennis Leg,’” published on August 30, 2018, in Workplace Health & Safety.

Domeracki and her co-authors have also developed a poster from the article, which was presented at the annual Association of Occupational Health Professionals in Healthcare National Conference in Glendale, Arizona, the week of September 5, 2018. The poster has also been presented at the UCSF OEM conference in March 2018 and at the annual American Association of Occupational Health Nurses National Conference in Reno, Nevada, in April 2018.

Kara Birch and Pop Health Team Receive Team PRIDE Award

Kara Birch (fourth from left) and the Pop Health Team Assistant Clinical Professor of Community Health Systems Kara Birch and her Interprofessional Care Support Team (Pop Health Team) won the UCSF Medical Center Team PRIDE Award, which was presented at the UCSF Health Honors & Awards gala on August 9. The team was recognized for its continuous demonstration of UCSF core values: professionalism, respect, integrity, diversity and excellence (PRIDE).

The Pop Health Team focuses on improving chronic complex illness management and outcomes for vulnerable populations, including patients with comorbid depression and chronic medical illness, as well as those undergoing high-risk transitions in care.

Surgical and Critical Care Fellowship for Nurse Practitioners Wins ANCC Accreditation

The UCSF Surgical and Critical Care Nurse Practitioner Fellowship program has been accredited with distinction as a Practice Transition Program by the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC)’s Commission on Accreditation.

The fellowship program for nurse practitioners, a joint program of the departments of surgery and anesthesia and of UCSF Medical Center, is designed to expand upon the knowledge and skills acquired during graduate nursing training. It prepares licensed and certified adult-gerontology acute care nurse practitioners (AG ACNPs) to provide care for adults in critical care and surgery settings through focused clinical rotations, and emphasizes advanced assessment, planning, negotiation and collaboration skills.