Reflective Practice: Transforming Education and Improving Outcomes

Gwen D. Sherwood, PhD, RN, FAAN, is professor and associate dean for academic affairs at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Nursing. She helped develop the Methodist Caring Tool to examine patient satisfaction with caring and she formerly worked at the University of Texas at Houston School of Nursing where she was co-investigator with the medical schools Center for Patient Safety to examine teamwork as a variable in patient safety. She served sits on the board of Sigma Theta Tau International. Dr. Sherwood is co-investigator on Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) initiative funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to transform nursing curriculum to prepare nurses in quality and safety for redesigned health care systems. She is nursing leader for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University Inter-professional Patient Safety Education Collaborative to measure effectiveness of teaching modalities for interdisciplinary teamwork training involving nursing and medical students. She participates in the annual Telluride Science Institute on interprofessional education with the University of Illinois at Chicago and was elected as Vice President for two terms on the international board of directors for Sigma Theta Tau International. Sara Horton Deutsch, PhD, RN, PMHCNS, is an associate professor and coordinator of the graduate psychiatric/mental health nursing program at Indiana University School of Nursing. She is a senior faculty member in the graduate psychiatric/mental health nursing program and teaches nursing leadership, psychiatric assessment, psychiatric clinical management and health promotion, and advanced psychiatric mental health nursing clinical practicum. Over the past three years she has served as the principal Investigator of a three-year advanced nursing education grant funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration aimed to increase the number, diversity, and distribution of advanced practice psychiatric nurses in rural and underserved regions of Indiana by making advanced education available through the development of a distance accessible program.