School of Nursing NewsRelease

SCHOOL OF NURSING ESTABLISHES NEW RESEARCH OFFICE

    GREENSBORO, N.C. – The School of Nursing at The University of North Carolina of Greensboro has established a new office of research and has appointed as director Dr. Debra Wallace, professor of nursing and president of the Southern Nursing Research Society.

Dr. Debra Wallace

    “Nursing research is crucial to making a positive difference in healthy lifestyles and patient outcomes,” said Dr. Lynn Pearcey, dean of the School of Nursing. “The School of Nursing takes seriously its obligation to help advance the state of the art in our field. With Dr. Wallace as director, we will be able to further develop, strengthen and focus our existing research program.”
    In addition to identifying funding sources and providing guidance for young faculty, Wallace said she will also facilitate collaborative projects with other researchers across the campus and Triad, including nutrition, exercise and gerontological scientists at UNCG, and pediatric scientists at Wake Forest University. Wallace also works closely with UNCG’s associate provost for research, who is now conducting meetings with area organizations to align the University’s research focus with needs in the Triad.
    Other service programs now under way in the School of Nursing are ready to move forward from the project phase to the research phase, Wallace said. These include College Bound Sisters, a nationally recognized adolescent pregnancy prevention program, and Point 4 the Future, a folic acid education campaign aimed at preventing birth defects. Additional grants will enable faculty involved in these and additional projects on breastfeeding and gerontology, to gather and publish scientific data so others may learn and borrow from their successes, she said.
    Wallace joined the faculty in August as a full professor, coming from the University of Tennessee. Her own research is concerned with risk factors for cardio-vascular disease in African-American and Hispanic women. She has published extensively, serves on the steering committee of the Council for the Advancement of Nursing Science, has had a seat on the National Nursing Research Roundtable for the National Institutes of Health, and is a reviewer for the Veterans Administration Nursing Research Initiative Grants. Wallace earned her Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina with a specialty in gerontology.
    The School of Nursing at UNCG is the largest in the state, with approximately 1,100 undergraduate and graduate students, and 50 faculty members. In addition to BSN and R.N.-to-BSN programs, it offers numerous graduate level concentrations, including nursing administration, nurse anesthesia (rated 8th in the nation by U.S. News & World Report), nursing education, adult nurse practitioner/gerontological nurse practitioner and MSN/MBA.

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