Three-day intensive interaction with Brittingham Visiting Scholar fulfills honors credits for required course

For three learning-intensive days, beginning April 14, 2004, the UW-Madison School of Nursing offered baccalaureate nursing students a unique and enriching opportunity to participate in the Brittingham Visiting Scholars Project, under the direction of Assistant Professor Barbara St. Pierre Schneider. School of Nursing faculty, staff, and students will welcomed Brittingham Visiting Scholar Margaret Heitkemper, PhD, RN, FAAN, to share her perspectives on skills, knowledge, resources, and interdisciplinary relationships needed to resolve patient-care challenges.

Heitkemper is from the University of Washington School of Nursing in Seattle, Washington, where she fulfills several distinguished roles: professor, chair of the Biobehavioral Nursing and Health Systems, director of the Center for Women’s Health Research, and the Corbally Professor in Public Service. During the past 22 years, her contributions have included educating undergraduate and graduate nursing students, researching the potential physiological and psychological causes or factors that exacerbate irritable bowel syndrome in women, leading reviews of research grants at the National Institute of Nursing Research and participating in the Society for Gastroenterological Nurses and the American Society of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition.

The essence of the Brittingham Visitng Scholars Project lies in its exponential value described by St. Pierre Schneider: “… to foster a partnership between the students and the scholar so that ideas can be exchanged freely and maximal learning can be achieved.” Accordingly, nursing students who have contracted for the N312 and N319 honors course for spring 2004 are offered the opportunity to engage in three days of intensive interaction—individually and as part of a group—with Dr. Heitkemper. After attending the three-day project, they are required to prepare a two-page outline on resolving an identified patient-care challenge. Project involvement satisfies the honors component of the required nursing course titled “Nursing Care of Persons Responding to Alterations in Body Systems."

Heitkemper’s visit is due to the foresight of St. Pierre Schneider, who applied for the Brittingham Foundation's visiting scholars grant. One of the foundation’s tenets is “to bring distinguished visitors to the classroom to introduce advanced undergraduate students to those working ‘in the field’ who can contribute directly to the knowledge and skills students will need upon graduation.”

St. Pierre Schneider submitted a proposal, outlining the need for baccalaureate-prepared nurses with in-depth knowledge and advanced skills in practice and research who will be able to challenge the increased health care demands of aging baby boomers amidst a nursing deficit. She then explained the ways in which scholar-candidate Heitkemper could contribute to this need through her research accomplishments in the area of gastrointestinal disorders as well as interdisciplinary work in physiology, medicine and nutrition to broaden an understanding of patient care challenges. The Brittingham Foundation accepted St. Pierre Schneider's grant submission.

Dr. Heitkemper presented "Irritable Bowel Syndrome: A Model of Interdisciplinary Research" on Thursday, April 15, 2004 from 3:00 pm to 4:00 p.m. in G5/119, Clinical Science Center, 600 Highland Ave. A reception followed in the Dean’s reception area in the K6/2 module after the presentation.