Pediatric nurse scientist awarded AACN Impact Research Grant

The American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) recently awarded a $50,000 AACN Impact Research Grant to Martha A.Q. Curley, RN, PhD, FAAN, a leading clinical scientist in pediatric critical care nursing.

Curley and her research team at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing, Philadelphia,will further assess the predictive validity of the Braden Q Scale for the development of immobility-related pressure ulcers and test a new element, referred to as the Braden Q+D, to describe pediatric patient risk for medical device-related pressure ulcers. Curley served as a principal investigator of the initial Braden Q instrument development study. The Braden Q instrument has become a widely used tool to predict pediatric pressure ulcer risk.

A significant percentage of infants and children on bedrest develop hospital-acquired pressure ulcers from immobility and medical devices. Efforts to improve patient outcomes continue to focus on preventing this complication. In addition, incidence rates are increasingly used as a nursing quality measure and benchmark for comparing care among hospitals.

A premier scientist with more than 20 years of scholarly contributions to pediatric critical care nursing, Curley holds appointments as the Ellen and Robert Kapito Professor in Nursing Science at Penn Nursing and as a nurse scientist in critical care and cardiovascular nursing at Children's Hospital Boston. Among her many honors, she received the prestigious AACN 2012 Distinguished Research Lectureship.

AACN Impact Research Grants support clinical inquiry that drives change in high acuity and critical care nursing practice. Priority projects address gaps in clinical research at the organization or system level and translation of these findings to bedside clinicians. Projects include use of technology to assess patients and manage outcomes; ways to create a healing and humane environment; and processes and systems to optimize high acuity and critical care nursing.

Three Impact Research Grants are available annually to established researchers and beginning researchers with mentors. Applicants may request up to $50,000 in total costs for a maximum of three years. This year, AACN awarded two grants.

A research team at Wayne State University School of Nursing, Detroit, led by Margaret "Meg" Campbell, RN, PhD, FAAN, also received an Impact Research Grant this year to investigate the potential of standardizing ventilator withdrawal — using an empirically developed, nurse-led, algorithmic approach — for patients at the end of life. The researchers will conduct the first study comparing outcomes for patients who received the new approach to patients who received usual care.

Other 2013 grants from AACN support a variety of projects ranging from research related to reducing the burden of cardiac monitor alarms in neurological intensive care units, to understanding the psychological processes of surrogates making end-of-life decisions for patients to examining the relationship between nursing care and outcomes for patients with in-hospital cardiac arrest. Recipients are as follows:
•James Dionne-Odom, RN, MSN, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, Lebanon, N.H. (AACN-Sigma Theta Tau Critical Care Grant)
•Monica Rochman, RN, PhD, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia (AACN-Philips Medical Systems Clinical Outcomes Grant)
•Tina Mammone, RN, MS, NE-BC, CENP, University of California San Francisco Medical Center (AACN-Philips Medical Systems Clinical Outcomes Grant)

The association continues to award annually the AACN-Sigma Theta Tau Critical Care Grant for up to $10,000and as many as three AACN-Philips Medical Systems Clinical Outcomes Grants, up to $10,000 each.