From the dean

Dear Friends,

The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared 2020 the Year of the Nurse and the Midwife. While we view every year as one to celebrate the nation’s most trusted profession, the WHO designation offers us an opportunity to share the impact of nursing and midwifery now and into the future with you.

As you’ll soon see, nurse-midwifery is prominent in this spring issue of Minnesota Nursing magazine. The School of Nursing has been educating midwives to provide culturally-sensitive women’s primary care and advancing midwifery for more than 45 years. Our cover story introduces you to four graduates from the Class of 2018 who joined Indian Health Service and are now practicing at the highest level of their scope to provide the highest quality of care to women in New Mexico and Alaska.

The WHO 2020 celebration invites us to secure the future of nursing and midwifery through the next generation of students. We introduce you to one of our amazing BSN students, Zoë Kondes. Zoë has recognized how nursing provides a platform to address some of society’s most pressing issues, particularly climate change. Another amazing student, Bridget Gehrz, shares how she plans to use what she’s learned in the Doctor of Nursing Practice Integrative Health and Healing specialty to partner with military families to help them manage the effects of PTSD and thrive.

Working in partnership is a tenet of the School of Nursing and is evident in our faculty’s research. In collaboration with the Minnesota Department of Health, Associate Professors Lauren Martin and Barb McMorris led a first-of-its-kind study on sexual exploitation among Minnesota youth. This research will soon pave the way for the state and school nurses to provide at-risk young people with the services and support they need.

We also share how informatics faculty members Karen Monsen and Robin Austin are teaming with a local organization to address the opioid epidemic and health disparities.

We invite you to join in celebrating the Year of the Nurse and the Midwife and enjoy reading Minnesota Nursing. As always, we look forward to your thoughts and comments.

I Am — We Are.
In gratitude

Connie White Delaney
Professor and Dean