Jennifer Pinto-Martin, PhD, & Leah Moran, MSN, Named Inaugural Penn Nurse Innovation Fellows

Newswise — PHILADELPHIA (January 11, 2017) – Jennifer Pinto-Martin, PhD, MPH, the Viola MacInnes/Independence Professor of Nursing, a Professor of Epidemiology in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and Executive Director of the Center for Public Health Initiatives; and Leah Moran, MSN, RN, Nurse Manager for the Cardiac Intermediate Care Unit at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, have been appointed the inaugural Penn Nurse Innovation Fellows. The Fellowship represents an important collaboration between the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing (Penn Nursing), Penn Medicine’s Center for Health Care Innovation (CHCI), and the Department of Nursing from the University of Pennsylvania Health System (UPHS). It supports nursing faculty and staff to develop an intellectual foundation in innovation methodology and gain expertise in rapidly testing new approaches to enhance health care delivery and patient outcomes.

“Both Dr. Pinto-Martin and Leah Moran make excellent inaugural recipients of this important fellowship,” said Regina Cunningham, PhD, RN, AOCN, Senior Vice President and Chief Nurse Executive for UPHS. “It is through this type of collaboration – nurses, researchers, physicians, developers coming together – that new avenues to improve patient experiences and outcomes will be developed.”

This program – formally launching in January 2017 – fosters multidisciplinary collaboration by enabling fellows to work directly with designers, developers and innovation specialists from the CHCI over the course of a semester. The Penn Nurse Innovation Fellows will learn disciplined techniques for testing potentially value-producing ideas faster, less expensively and more reliably. These skills will enable them to drive change in health care within Penn Medicine and at the local, state and national levels.

“Nurses are natural innovators. The opportunity to embed Fellows within the Penn Medicine Center for Health Care Innovation provides opportunities to not only learn different approaches – but also to provide patient and family perspectives to on-going work within the Center,” said Penn Nursing Dean Antonia Villarruel, PhD, RN, FAAN.The program is the result of ongoing conversations within Penn Nursing, nursing at Penn Medicine, and the CHCI as they work together to recognize and support nursing’s critical role in innovation. They are joined in this effort by CHCI’s Executive Director David Asch MD, MBA, and its Chief Innovation Officer, Roy Rosin.

The Center for Health Care Innovation launched in 2012 under the leadership of UPHS CEO Ralph W. Muller, Perelman School of Medicine Dean J. Larry Jameson, MD, PhD, and Kevin Mahoney, Executive Vice President of UPHS and vice dean of the Perelman School of Medicine.

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Editor’s Note: A high-resolution head shot of Pinto-Martin and Moran is available for publication. Please contact Ed Federico.

About the University of Pennsylvania School of NursingThe University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing is one of the world’s leading schools of nursing, is consistently ranked as one of the top graduate nursing schools in the United States, and is among the nation’s top recipients of nursing research funding from the National Institutes of Health. 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.