Yale Bulletin and Calendar

February 23, 2001

Volume 29, Number 20

Pioneering nurses will be honored
at center's annual convocation

The Center for Excellence in Chronic Illness Care at the Yale School of Nursing (YSN) will hold its annual convocation on Tuesday, Feb. 27.

The event -- featuring a keynote address by YSN scholar Donna Diers and honoring two outstanding nurses, one who is creating a children's hospice and one who pioneered innovations in cardiac care -- will be held at 4 p.m. at the school's 100 Church St. South campus. A reception will follow.

Diers is the Annie Goodrich Professor of Nursing, a former YSN dean and former editor of Image: Journal of Nursing Scholarship. Her topic will be "Between Policy and Practice."

Diers emerged as a leader in nursing research in the 1960s, when Yale made history by mounting the first controlled clinical trials in nursing. A prolific writer, Diers is known for her articles promoting nursing's role and its potential in the health care system. Her work regularly appears in nursing journals, and has also been published in The New England Journal of Medicine, The New York Times and other prominent media. Her current research focuses on large administrative data sets typically kept by hospitals. Diers uses this data to extract important clinical information, which can in turn improve practice and influence policy. She consults internationally about the uses of such data and its impact upon policy.

Also during the convocation, the 2001 Excellence in Caring in Chronic Illness Awards will be given to Amy S. Kuhner, founder and executive director of Sunshine House, and Janet Parkosewich, a cardiac clinical nurse
specialist at Yale-New Haven Hospital.

Kuhner is working to build the first children's hospice in the United States to care for young terminal patients in a home-like and child-friendly space. She recently received federal support for the project.

Parkosewich works with other nurses, physicians and various staff members to raise standards in cardiac care. Among the innovations she's fostered are quicker emergency room response for heart attack patients, peer education that pairs former and current patients, and statewide education for emergency medical technicians. In addition to her clinical duties, Parkosewich is actively engaged in research and is currently pursing a doctorate at YSN.

The Center for Excellence in Chronic Illness Care promotes research that improves quality of life and survival for families living with AIDS, cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and other chronic illnesses. The center is also dedicated to the prevention of chronic illnesses.

For more information, call Nancy DeMatteo at (203) 737-5501.

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Pioneering nurses will be honored at center's annual convocation

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Campus Notes