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News — UTHealth Houston has made an unprecedented commitment to nursing science by establishing the interdisciplinary Cizik Nursing Research Institute. Building on the momentum of Cizik School of Nursing’s growing portfolio of studies funded by the National Institutes of Health, the institute will provide key resources that nurse scientists need to advance meaningful programs of research.

The institute had been envisioned since 2017 when gave $25 million to the school, which was renamed in their honor. Their foundational endowment also funds PhD student scholarships, faculty chairs, and an annual distinguished lecture series.

“The Cizik family’s vision and commitment to nursing education and research will benefit not only our school but our patients and communities for decades to come,” said Diane Santa Maria, DrPH, MSN, RN, dean of Cizik School of Nursing. “This next phase of their endowment will propel continued growth in the number, size, and impact of meaningful nursing science studies at Cizik School of Nursing.” 

, PhD, RN, professor of research, joined the school in August 2023 and was charged with founding and leading the institute as its executive director. She brought with her a well-established program of research in dementia family caregiving with more than $13 million in funding from the National Institute on Aging (NIA). Pickering recently secured another $5.25 million NIA award to establish the.

“Nursing is the backbone of the public’s health. It is the largest global health care profession and has been the most trusted profession in the U.S. for over 20 years,” Pickering said. “Nursing science’s unique perspective on health has a holistic focus, situating health within the context of how and where people live.”

Establishing an institute within UTHealth Houston involves developing partnerships with other schools and outside organizations to coordinate and promote a broad area of research, education, patient care, and/or public service. The Cizik Nursing Research Institute will pull together faculty and resources from across the university’s schools including McGovern Medical School, D. Bradley McWilliams School of Biomedical Informatics, UTHealth Houston School of Public Health, and the new UTHealth Houston School of Behavioral Health Sciences.

“The designation as an institute provides more formalized infrastructure and support from the university in developing nursing science,” said Pickering, who also holds the title of the Isla Carroll Turner Chair in Gerontological Nursing. “It signifies that nursing science is a priority for the university. It will help us develop and grow research teams with other schools and institutes to lead clinical and community-based innovations.”

In addition to the administrative core headed by Pickering, the institute will incorporate four cores that support nursing science.

• The Research Informatics Core will build a data management infrastructure to make advanced informatics tools and methodologies accessible to researchers. This will include compiling novel data warehouses on social and behavioral health, streamlining research approval processes, and providing multifaceted training on data analytics. Serving as the core’s director will be Brad Cannell, PhD, MPH, associate professor with McGovern Medical School.
• The Biobehavioral Health Research Core will promote research into the fundamental biological nature of behavior disorders using a collaborative model that links lab scientists with patient-facing investigators. It will be housed within the Biological Sciences Laboratory at Cizik School of Nursing and incorporate high-quality tissue samples with extensive clinical and sociodemographic data to drive evidence-based research, especially into how epigenetics modifications affect behavior. The core’s director is Consuelo Walss-Bass, PhD, professor and the John S. Dunn Foundation Distinguished Chair with the Louis A. Faillace, MD, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at McGovern Medical School.
• The Vulnerable Populations Research Core will focus on reducing health disparities by supporting studies of populations that are often excluded from research, including groups subject to exploitation and stigmatization. The team, led by , PhD, MSEd, associate professor of research at Cizik School of Nursing, will include bilingual research assistants and qualitative methods experts. Hernandez also holds the Lee and Joseph Jamail Distinguished Professorship at Cizik School of Nursing.
• The Clinical Innovations and Translational Nursing Science Core will focus on translating nursing science discoveries into evidence-based patient care. It will serve as a hub for fostering collaborations among academic researchers and health system partners, including UT Physicians, the clinical practice of McGovern Medical School. It will also serve as a bridge between nurses in the Texas Medical Center with research-focused Doctor of Philosophy in Nursing degrees and those with practice-focused Doctor of Nursing Practice degrees to foster collaboration on research and quality improvement projects in the early stages of development. Recruitment of a director is underway.

Increasing funded research, building partnerships, and attracting faculty, PhD students, and postdoctoral fellows to UTHealth Houston are among the goals for the institute. However, the more important and immediate objective is to help current nursing faculty reach their fullest potential and flourish through a robust and supportive infrastructure, Pickering said.

“Regardless of their focus, faculty will find more opportunities to collaborate and meet new people, and to have more innovative and timely professional development around current trends and funding,” Pickering said. 

Serving on the center’s internal advisory committee will be Sandra Hanneman, PhD, RN, holder of the Jerold B. Katz Distinguished Professorship for Nursing Research at Cizik School of Nursing; Ron Acierno, PhD, professor and vice chair of veteran affairs in the Louis A. Faillace Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and executive director of the UTHealth Houston Trauma and Resilience Center; Xiaoqian Jiang, PhD, associate professor and center director of Secure Artificial Intelligence For Healthcare at McWilliams School of Biomedical Informatics; Bijal Balasubramanian, PhD, MBBS, professor, regional dean of UTHealth Houston School of Public Health in Dallas, and The Rockwell Distinguished Chair in Society and Health; and Kimberly Alleman, MSN, RN, chief nursing officer for UT Physicians.

External advisory committee members will be Hudson Santos, PhD, RN, dean of the School of Nursing and Health Studies at the University of Miami; Allison Vorderstrasse, DNSc, RN, dean of the Elaine Marieb College of Nursing at the University of Massachusetts – Amherst; and Maria Yefimova, PhD, RN, lead nurse scientist with the University of California-San Francisco Health System.

All faculty and nurses in the UTHealth Houston system, including those with UT Physicians, may apply for CNRI membership. Application and membership details will be available soon on the forthcoming website, uth.edu/cizik-nursing-research-institute.