Marilyn Rantz, Amy Vogelsmeier, Lori Popejoy, and Shari Kist
University of Missouri Sinclair School of Nursing

Please describe your work with the COVID-19 pandemic.
Our research team has a study underway in 40 Missouri nursing homes with APRNs working full time in 16 of them to improve care and reduce avoidable hospitalizations. In this pandemic, the APRNs are there every day, working side by side with direct-care staff, helping leadership and staff take better care of residents. They help reassure staff, residents, and families that everyone is doing their best to keep people healthy. All staff are very worried about supplies and doing what is best to prevent spread of COVID-19. 

Please give us information about your background and history as a nurse scientist.

Lucia Wocial
Fairbanks Center for Medical Ethics

Please describe your work with the COVID-19 pandemic.
I am working on triage protocols, identifying resources to address and alleviate moral distress and have been approached by international colleagues wanting to use my instrument (moral distress thermometer) for real time assessment or front line provider moral distress. 

What else would you like the public to know about your role or the role of nurse scientists in the fight against COVID-19?
The ethical challenges for nurses on the front lines are real. People can help us by being patient, and be engaging in difficult conversations about what matters most to them if they were to get sick with COVID-19 and die from it. This is especially important for people with serious illness.

Candy Wilson
Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences

Please describe your work with the COVID-19 pandemic.
We are focusing on research topics for COVID-19 to support nurses caring for patients.

Please give us information about your background and history as a nurse scientist.
I am a military nurse scientist for 12 years. My research background is on symptom science.

Kelly L Wierenga
Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis

Please describe your work with the COVID-19 pandemic.
I am currently a PI on a behavioral health study. The purpose of this study is to understand the influence of the COVID-19 infection on people during a time of increased social distancing and prevention measures.

Please give us information about your background and history as a nurse scientist.
My program of research focuses on improving recovery and secondary prevention. My research interests lie in how improving abilities to adaptively regulate emotions during a stressful period of recovery can improve symptoms of depression and anxiety. These improvements in psychological symptoms paired with traditional recovery and treatment programs may increase the uptake and sustaining of healthy behaviors long-term. I have developed a treatment using mechanisms of emotion regulation to support recovery and improves weekly physical activity in the cardiovascular rehabilitation population. This treatment has demonstrated early efficacy in a small pilot sample and was recently refined by my team for testing in rural populations with remote access.

To view the remarks of the White House regarding its meeting with leaders of the Nursing Community Coalition, click here. The NCC discussed how to ensure the health and safety of the nursing workforce during the COVID-19 public health challenge.

Jason Farley, PhD, MPH, ANP-BC, FAAN, AACRN
The Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing

Please describe your work with the COVID-19 pandemic.
My list of responsibilities include COVID-19 screening tent lead; COVID-19 healthcare worker screening; leading a research group designing serosurveillance approaches to evaluate community penetrance.

Please give us information about your background and history as a nurse scientist.
I am a professor of nursing, an infectious disease-trained nurse epidemiologist, and a nurse practitioner in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins Schools of Nursing and Medicine. My research seeks to streamline care approaches that optimize navigation, linkage, engagement, and retention in care for persons with infectious diseases, including studies designed to keep patients engaged in care over long periods of illness. I am the director and founder of the REACH Initiative serving Baltimore City residents living with and at risk for HIV and associated co-infections. I am a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing, most recently serving as chair of the Emerging Infectious Diseases Expert Panel. As a seasoned infection-prevention expert, I was part of a Johns Hopkins team evaluating the SARS response in China at an affiliated institution as well as country-level health system responses to tuberculosis and HIV. I also maintain a clinical practice as a nurse practitioner in the John G. Bartlett Specialty Clinic for Infectious Disease. I have previously served as a nurse infection-control epidemiologist for the Johns Hopkins Hospital.

FNINR is so proud of the work nurse scientists do every day. This drives FNINR's commitment to advocate for consistent and expanded funding for NINR. The research done by nurses and nurse scientists impacts every American and this is especially true as we battle the COVID-19 pandemic.

In an effort to shed light on some of the nurse scientist heroes impacting our country's fight to contain and eliminate the virus, FNINR is asking for stories of the nurse scientists on the front line of the COVID-19 pandemic so we can profile and highlight the work of these individuals and teams. If you are a nurse scientist working in this area, please fill out this brief form so we can highlight you and your work. Please feel free to share this link with colleagues.