Newswise — The University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing’s (Penn Nursing) Eileen T. Lake, PhD, RN, FAAN, the Jessie M. Scott Endowed Term Chair in Nursing and Health Policy, Associate Professor of Nursing, Associate Professor of Sociology, and the Associate Director of the Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research, has been named the Editor-in-Chief of the journal Research in Nursing & Health (RINAH). RINAH, which celebrates its 40th anniversary this year, is a top-tier, peer-reviewed journal that publishes a wide range of research to inform the practice of nursing and other health disciplines.

“Becoming editor-in-chief of RINAH is a dream come true as it has always been the nursing research journal that best fits my broad view of nursing science,’ said Lake. “My vision is to elevate RINAH internationally, and with it, nursing science. By enhancing the journal’s reputation, its impact will increase, attracting the attention of practitioners and policy makers who read it. Increased readership will speed the translation of research evidence into practice and policy.”

Penn Nursing is a natural fit for the RINAH editorship, with the School’s reputation as an intellectual and transformative force for improving health through nursing. Penn Nursing is ranked first in National Institutes of Health research dollars, among schools of nursing.  Lake’s research centers on how the organizational context of care, including the work environment, nurse staffing, and nurses’ educational preparation, influence quality of care and outcomes.  She is motivated by the pivotal role of nurses in health care delivery that is frequently limited by weak organizational support for nurses. Lake’s three, currently-funded interdisciplinary studies link hospital nursing resources, such as the work environment and staffing, to quality outcomes such as parent satisfaction in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), readmission rates for prevalent health conditions among hospitalized adults, and mortality among hospitalized patients in Chile.  Her studies have large, national samples of 280 neonatal intensive care units, 636 Magnet hospitals, accredited for achieving excellent nursing standards, and non-Magnet hospitals, and 45 public and private hospitals in Chile, respectively.  Lake’s Spanish proficiency and representation of Penn Nursing on the PanAmerican Nursing and Midwifery Collaborating Centers will foster a pipeline of potential publications from South America, which is one of her goals for the journal.

Lake developed and stewards the National Quality Forum (NQF)-endorsed Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index. This instrument has been translated into 23 languages and has generated multi-national evidence showing that better nurse work environments yield superior quality of care. She serves on the editorial advisory boards of American Nurse Today, American Journal of Maternal Child Nursing, and Metas de Enfermería, a Spanish nursing journal.

Lake’s awards include the 2011 Distinguished Alumna of her alma mater, Duke University School of Nursing, the 2014 Research Mentorship Award of AcademyHealth Interest Group on Nursing Issues, and the 2017 Dean’s Award for Undergraduate Scholarly Mentorship.

Lake earned a PhD in Sociology and a MS in Nursing Administration from the University of Pennsylvania, a MA in Public Policy from Georgetown University, and a BS in Nursing from Duke University. 

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About the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing

The University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing is one of the world’s leading schools of nursing. For the second year in a row, it is ranked the #1 nursing school in the world by QS University, and has four graduate programs ranked number one by U.S. News & World Report, the most of any school in the United States. Penn Nursing is currently ranked # 1 in funding from the National Institutes of Health, among other schools of nursing. Penn Nursing prepares nurse scientists and nurse leaders to meet the health needs of a global society through research, education, and practice. Follow Penn Nursing on: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram & YouTube.