U.S. nursing research institute appoints dentist as interim director
The National Institute for Nursing Research, which disburses federal grants, recently announced that its interim director would be…a dentist. But non-nurses are non-qualified to evaluate grants for nursing research. And the appointment reinforces the inaccurate stereotype that nurses are unskilled handmaidens, rather than autonomous health professionals. Join us in asking for these two appointments be rescinded and for nurses to be appointed!
August 2019 – This month a dentist and a biologist were appointed interim director and deputy director of the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR), after the resignation of Ann Cashion, RN, PhD, FAAN. NINR is the division of the U.S. National Institutes of Health that makes grants for nursing research, and its FY 2019 budget was about $163 million. It should be obvious that non-nurses are in no position to ably perform these important nursing jobs. Would NIH appoint a nurse to oversee dental research funding? But what may be less obvious is the damage such appointments cause to nursing as a whole. They wrongly suggest that nursing is not a distinct health profession, but something anyone with some health-related background can do. In fact, nursing is an autonomous profession with a unique knowledge base and scope of practice. Nurses are educated by nurses, licensed by nursing bodies, and supervised by nurses in the clinical setting. Nurses independently engage in 24/7 surveillance to detect and resolve life-threatening problems. And nurses spend many years obtaining doctorates in nursing so they can pursue their own ground-breaking research, sometimes with funding granted by NINR. The idea that a non-nurse could competently oversee an elite nursing institution or evaluate proposals for nursing research with a view to spending taxpayer dollars on them presents a threat to both nursing and society.
Most decision-makers do not understand the value of nursing or know that nurses save lives. So nurses do not receive enough respect or resources. Clinical nurses are understaffed, threatening patients’ lives. Many nursing faculty are also overworked and underpaid. The stereotype of nurses as low-skilled handmaidens who need physicians to oversee them remains common, fueled by the news media and of course Hollywood. (We admit that suggesting nurses need dentists and biologists to oversee them is an innovation.) But damaging ideas about nursing can also be fueled by public sector leaders who make high-profile decisions that reinforce these inaccurate stereotypes, as this one by NIH does.
Please click here join our campaign to urge NIH to reverse these interim appointments and immediately appoint qualified nursing leaders instead!
A dentist in charge of nursing research. May I suggest there are a number of nurses that would be qualified to head up a nursing focused research department. A dentist is not a nurse and a dentist has no knowledge of nursing theory or what is important to nursing or the nursing profession. Further more no physician knows nursing theory nor nursing research. Nursing is separate to but collaborative with medicine not dentistry. This is buzzard at best.
This appointment reads” political ”or” rich taking care of rich”. Please explain to me and everyone else his qualifications for this outrageous act. This position should. be held by a nurse.I am sure you would be able to find a nurse with the qualification to do the job.Do what is right and ethical and appointment a nurse.
Starting a tag on Twitter & LinkedIn
#nursesknowhow
I invite you to join the movement.
As a highly educated nurse, with post masters education, I find the appointment of non nurses to such a important nursing organization an insult to my profession. I have written and carried out my own research to obtain my Masters in Nursing. I did not reach out to other professions for guidance and evaluation, I worked with many skilled and talented nurses all of whom had there PhD’s and DNP. This was in 1988. Please reconsider and show my profession the respect it deserves.
FTLOG NO ,There are multiple highly qualified nurse leaders in the USA ! Dentistry is not Nursing. This is another swipe at the heart and soul of nursing by bureaucrats in the swamp of government.
While I’m not familiar with the trading Dentist receive during their education process on how funding for research projects in my BSN program and even more so in my MSN program, I do find the fact that a dentist is in charge of distributing funding for research projects. The position would also include other duties that I feel would be best served by a person with a Nursing Degree would be more appropriate for performing the duties as director of the NINR than a person with a Dentist degree. If the tables were turned, I’m sure the governing dental equivalent position as the NINR would not want a Nurse as Interim director. Hopefully a nurse will be appointed as permanent director.
Correction to the first sentence in the above comment – the word trading should be training.