U.Va. Nursing Professor Receives Research Award

Jan. 10, 2007 -- The Southern Nursing Research Society has granted its 2007 Distinguished Nurse Researcher Award to Dr. Richard H. Steeves, the Madeline Higginbotham Sly Professor of Nursing at the University of Virginia School of Nursing.  he award recognizes not only Dr. Steeves’ outstanding scholarly contributions to nursing knowledge and a sustained publishing record, but also his support and mentoring of other researchers and scholars as noted by the three previous winners who nominated him.  He will be recognized at the Society’s Annual Meeting where he will deliver a research presentation. 

The Southern Nursing Research Society is devoted to promoting the development and utilization of nursing research in all health care agencies and educational settings throughout a fourteen state region in the Southern United States plus the Caribbean, Latin America and South America.  Nursing research is the foundation for “evidence-based practice” that results in more effective patient care and improved patient outcomes.

Dr. Steeves, who is also a Fellow in the American Academy of Nursing, has specialized in the study of cancer, bereavement, suffering and, most recently, intimate partner homicide.  His professional trajectory was set when he worked with Jean Quint Benoliel, his doctoral advisor, mentor and nursing pioneer in issues of death and dying.  She was the only nurse in “The Work Group” that included the renowned Dr. Kubler-Ross of On Death and Dying.  Today, he is the Principal Investigator for an NIH-funded study of the long-term effects upon children when one parent murders the other.  Since about as many children are affected by uxoricide each year as those diagnosed with childhood leukemia, this first study of its kind could have far reaching impact.  The next phase of his team’s work will be to develop a web-based intervention to enable guardians to more effectively help these children. 

The University of Virginia School of Nursing is rated among the nation’s top nursing schools; three of its graduate programs are ranked in the U.S. News & World Report’s Top Ten and it is 22nd in the country in National Institutes of Health (NIH) nursing research funding.  It ranks #1 in the country in National Research Service Awards (NRSA) from the NIH to support research training.  The School currently has approximately 550 students enrolled in it undergraduate, master’s degree, post-master’s, and PhD programs.  For more information, visit www.nursing.virginia.edu or call 434-961-4503.

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