Faculty and Interests
KU nurse scientists and faculty directly serve communities and nursing workforce programs across the state and beyond. Explore each nurse researcher below.
Discovery Research Faculty
Dr. Samantha Cintron focuses on advancing precision health in cardiometabolic disease by examining the physiological mechanisms underlying heart failure with preserved ejection fraction and obesity
Dr. Michelle Cochran’s research spans global and population health to build a stronger health workforce for rural and underserved communities. She uses Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) to connect students and partners worldwide around shared health challenges.
Dr. Amanda Emerson’s research focuses on barriers to health equity in women affected by involvement in the criminal legal system. She has R01 and PCORI funding and is a Frontier’s KL2 scholar and a Betty Irene Moore fellow.
Dr. Diane Mahoney research focuses on the discovery of new biomarkers to allow for early screening and detection of ovarian cancer, currently investigating the role of the human microbiome (microbes such as bacteria) in ovarian cancer development and progression. She was named a rising research star within KU and works closely with the University of Kansas Cancer Center.
Dr. Jamie Myers’ research focuses on the prevention and management of adverse events associated with cancer and cancer treatment. She investigates interventions to address the changes in cancer patients’ cognitive function, to improve cancer-related sleep disturbance, and to test the impact of community navigation partnerships on reducing financial toxicity.
Dr. Jill Peltzer is a certified transcultural nurse and a health equity researcher whose focus is structural determinants of health and inequities among minoritized and marginalized populations. She co-leads a community-academic team to address racial inequities across the breast cancer continuum among Black and African American women using shared power, decision-making and trust.
Dr. Janet Pierce is a University Distinguished Professor whose research focuses on antioxidants, oxidative stress, and mitochondrial dysfunction as key biological mechanisms underlying symptom burden in heart failure and Long COVID. Using a symptom science framework, her work investigates the mechanisms of fatigue and other persistent symptoms while evaluating targeted interventions that improve mitochondrial bioenergetics, reduce reactive oxygen species, and improves patient outcomes.
For more than 20 years, Dr. Pierce has been studying antioxidants in various diseases to determine the effects on the diaphragm, lungs, myocardium, brain and kidneys. Dr. Pierce has had continuous research funding at KUMC for over 30 years. She recently completed a randomized double-blinded clinical trial funded by the National Institutes of Health, and the National Institute on Aging to study the effects of ubiquinol (active form of Coenzyme Q10) and D-ribose in patients with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction. The purpose of this study was to determine if these two supplements can improve the bioenergetics of the myocardium and reduce symptom burden. She is currently investigating the pathophysiology and symptoms of post-COVID-19 syndrome. Dr. Pierce was recently been funded by DOD, TSNRP to study the prevalence of post-COVID-19 syndrome in active duty military personnel.
Dr. Qiuhua Shen focuses on understanding pathophysiologic mechanisms underlying symptoms and developing interventions to reduce symptom burden and improve patient outcomes. Her research interest areas include heart failure, Long COVID, precision health, symptom science, and data science.
Dr. Kristi Williams’ research is in gerontology, improving care of older adults including persons with dementia and supporting family and professional caregivers through developing and testing communication and technology-based interventions. She developed CHAT/CHATO – Changing Talk training program to educate nursing home staff about person-centered communication strategies.
Clinical Scholarship and Workforce Development Faculty
Dr. Kelly Bosak’s research focuses on exercise adherence in adults with heart failure. She leads the Advanced Nursing Education‐Nurse Practitioner Residency Fellowship program (ANE-NPRF).
Dr. Becky Christian focuses her research on children and adolescents with chronic conditions – the interplay among physiologic, functional, psychosocial, and development characteristics as children integrate chronic illness into their everyday lives; and how families adapt to and manage their child’s chronic condition and/or physical disability.
Dr. Carissa Coleman focuses on improving the quality of care and quality of life for older adults. Her research examines communication, dementia care, intervention development, and the implementation of evidence-based practices in real-world healthcare settings, with a particular emphasis on nursing homes and home-based care.
Dr. Jean Giddens’ scholarship focuses on sustained innovation in teaching and learning, concept-based curricula, competency assessment, models of care, and academic progression. She is editor of Concepts for Nursing Practice, author of Mastering Concept-Based Teaching and Competency Assessment, and co-author of Health Assessment for Nursing Practice.
Dr. Kesa Herlihy’s research focuses on advancing evidence-based nursing education practices as well as identity-based patient bias and women’s health. She leads the Maternity Care Nursing Workforce Expansion (MATCARE) training program.
Dr. Teri Kennedy focuses on health and aging policy, sustainability, interprofessional academic-practice partnerships, interprofessional practice and education, and team science. She leads the Kansas 4M Geriatric Workforce Education program.
Dr. Laura Klenke-Borgmann is a simulation scholar. Her work integrates SimZones, assessment science, and structured experiential learning to advance practice readiness.
Barbara MacArthur leads the Kansas Nursing Workforce Center, a statewide initiative focused on arming decision makers with information that educates, sustains and retains the Kansas nursing workforce.
Dr. Shin Hye Park researches nursing workforce, work environments, staffing, turnover; patient outcomes, safety, quality indicator development; and national nursing and health care quality databases. She is the Nurse Scientist for the Kansas Nursing Workforce Center.
Dr. Karen Weis focuses on maternal mental health and birth outcomes and rural nursing and workforce policies. She has developed the Mentors Offering Maternal Support -(M-O-M-S™) intervention and leads the Sunflower-MOMS: A Coordinated Network for Refining and Sustaining Risk-Appropriate Obstetrical Care to Rural Kansas.
Maternal Perinatal Mental Health and Pregnancy and Birth Outcomes: My primary research interest is maternal perinatal mental health and its affect on maternal and fetal/infant health. Funding for this work has included large studies that tracked maternal, pregnancy-specific anxiety and depressive symptoms from first trimester through delivery assessing pregnancy complications and poor birth outcomes. Funding also included the affect of prenatal maternal mental health on postpartum maternal adaptation and maternal-infant bonding. We are now studying the affect of anxiety and depressive symptoms on maternal and fetal inflammatory responses.
Dr. Frances Yang is a gerontologist and epidemiologist with expertise in examining the measurement of person-centered health outcomes in the presence of comorbid chronic health conditions, racial/ethnic/cultural, language, and rural/urban differences. She serves as key personnel on KU Nursing workforce grants.