CCIR Funded Pilot Studies
Each academic year, the CCIR funds three pilot studies. A member of the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing faculty serves as an investigator on each study, collaborating with scientists and scholars from across the Hopkins community and beyond. The 2008 recipients will focus on MRSA infection in mental health patients, test a health promotion strategy for low-income, minority older adults, and address cancer health disparities among older, rural-dwelling African Americans.
Assistant Professor Jason Farley, PhD, MPH, NP, an expert in the 
prevention and management of infectious diseases, is collaborating with nurses and physicians at The Johns Hopkins Hospital (JHH) to learn more about mental health patients' vulnerability to Community-Associated Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (CA-MRSA). The multidisciplinary team plans to test patients for MRSA on admission to two psychiatric units at JHH, and test them again when they are discharged. Farley and his co-investigators will use the data to evaluate if MRSA transmission is occurring, which could pave the way for future interventions that will help reduce risk of transmission.
Farley's co-investigators are Karen C. Carroll, MD, Trish Perl, MD, and Jeffery Hsu, MD from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, along with Anne Caston-Gaa, RN, MPH, and Jamie Stafford, RN, BSN from the Johns Hopkins Hospital.
Assistant Professor Sarah Szanton, PhD, CRNP, is exploring the effectiveness of a low-cost, low-tech approach to promote the health of low-income, minority older adults, a population at greater than average risk for disability and death. She and her collaborative team are building on anecdotal evidence to systematically evaluate health outcomes of ElderSHINE (Support, Honor, Inspire, Nurture, Evolve), a program that trains low-income minority seniors in mindfulness-based meditation and self-efficacy. By comparing 25 new participants randomly assigned to intervention or to social support control groups on behavioral, social, and biological measures, such as stress hormones, blood pressure, heart rate, perceived stress, depression, and social support, Szanton hopes to see if ElderSHINE's meditation and self-efficacy training can help improve health measures and reduce stress in a high-risk minority population of elders.
Co-investigators include School of Nursing faculty Carmalyn Dorsey, MS, RN, and Gayle Page, DNSc, RN, FAAN, along with Rachel Piferi, PhD of the Johns Hopkins University Psychological and Brain Sciences Department, and Amy Bloom Connolly, Intervention Coordinator.
Assistant Professor Jennifer Wenzel, PhD, RN, CCM, is seeking to address cancer health disparities among rural-dwelling older African Americans who are diagnosed and being treated for cancer. By developing and evaluating a train-the-trainer program to equip nurse-led community health worker teams in rural Virginia, Wenzel and her team hope to provide a culturally appropriate cancer navigation intervention for this group of individuals at risk for poorer health outcomes.
Wenzel's co-investigator is Mollie Howerton, PhD, MPH, with the School of Medicine. Other significant contributors include School of Nursing faculty member Jerilyn Allen, ScD, RN, FAAN as project mentor, along with project advisors Jean Ford, MD (School of Medicine/School of Public Health), Sharon Krumm, PhD, RN (Johns Hopkins Hospital), and Gary Shapiro, MD (Johns Hopkins Bayview) and consultant Karen Meneses, PhD, RN, FAAN from the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Nursing.
