U. S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna E. Shalala has appointed Yale School of Nursing Associate Dean Margaret Grey, DrPH, PNP, FAAN, to the National Advisory Council for Nursing Research.
The council determines how federal dollars for nursing research should be spent. Her four-year term will begin in February 2000.
Grey is one of only three nurses on the 12-member council, which has enormous influence on the course of nursing science. In addition to making decisions on individual grant requests, the council more broadly influences the areas in which federal dollars will be concentrated.
Historically, the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) has devoted a relatively high percentage of funds to research training as opposed to research projects.
“That’s a reflection of the developmental nature of our science,” said Grey. “As more senior researchers emerge in the discipline, we’ll see a shift in our funding priorities. How that shift will take place is one of the major issues that NINR will face in the next five to ten years.”
Grey has a distinguished record of clinical research concentrating on the adaptation of children and their families to diabetes. In a health care system that often focuses on acute illness, she is a strong advocate for systemic change to better support people living with chronic conditions.
“My own area of interest is patients with chronic illness,” she said. “I strongly believe that more research is needed to chart strategies to help the large and underserved community of families coping with chronic illness.”
Grey will continue to serve as the nursing school’s associate dean for research affairs and Independence Professor of Nursing.
“Margaret Grey has overseen a tremendous period of growth in YSN’s research effort that included the founding of our doctoral program,” said Dean Catherine L. Gilliss. “The same intelligence and passion that she has brought to scholarship at Yale will now go to serve the profession of nursing as a whole.”
“Obviously, as dean of the school I’m pleased to see faculty appointed to prestigious bodies. But on this occasion, I am pleased mainly as a nurse, because having Margaret Grey chart the course for nursing research in the next century is one of the best things that could happen to this profession that she and I love so much.”
