Susan M. Rawl, PhD, RN, FAAHB, FAANChair, National Advisory Council, Council for the Advancement of Nursing Science
Hope you are all off to a great start in the new year! We are kicking off 2023 by celebrating the second year of a three-year 50th Anniversary Celebration of the American Academy of Nursing. The theme of the 2022 Health Policy Conference, From Reflection to Impact: Positioning Nursing's Future, highlighted the Academy's commitment to examining its past to better position the organization for a stronger, more equitable future. This year, the Council for the Advancement of Nursing Science (CANS), as a signature initiative of the Academy, will embrace and highlight the theme of “Celebration.” There is much to celebrate about nursing science's contributions to advancing health equity, and yet still more work to be done.
CANS leadership is excited about the work underway to support our mission of Better Health Through Nursing Science and advance our goals to:
- •Be a voice of nurse scientists at the national and international levels;
- •Support the development, conduct, and utilization of nursing science; and
- •Facilitate life-long learning opportunities for nurse scientists.
As we launch the new year, I am pleased to share some of the work being conducted by our dedicated volunteer members.
The National Advisory Council appreciated the valuable feedback attendees provided by completing evaluations of our State of the Science on Nursing Research Congress held last September. Attendees were highly satisfied with various components of the conference, including the ease of registration, featured speakers, content in the special sessions and presentations, in addition to the clarity of information communicated to attendees. We were pleased to welcome 413 attendees in total and provide nursing continuing professional development certificates to 184 attendees. We also received excellent recommendations for future CANS conference topics which have already informed the theme and selection of content for the 2023 Advanced Methods Conference.
Our Program Committee, chaired by Dr. Hudson Santos, has been working hard to plan the 2023 Advanced Methods conference that will be held virtually on September 13 this year. The theme is “Bio and Social Methods to Advance Health Equity” and will center topics such as community engagement in research and sex and gender as bio-social variables. We hope you will plan to attend. Additional information on the conference will be provided in the near future to help with your planning. It's never too early to start thinking about preparing an abstract to share your important research at the Advanced Methods Conference.
The Membership Committee, chaired by Dr. Susan Loeb, will be working to reach out to CANS members to better understand the specific aspects and opportunities of CANS membership that bring added value. We are encouraged by our consistently strong engagement across our three membership types.
This past December, members of our Science Committee, chaired by Dr. Ann Marie McCarthy, met with representatives from the National Institutes of Health Center for Scientific Review to discuss CANS’ process for nominating our members to serve as study section reviewers. Through that discussion, CANS will refine our nominations process and evaluate our success to improve future application cycles. Please be on the lookout for more information about how you can nominate yourself or a colleague to serve as an NIH reviewer. In addition, to support the development of our members who wish to serve as NIH grant reviewers, members of the Science Committee and our Mid-Career Special Interest Group (SIG) will work together to offer a webinar on the NIH grant review process On March 8, 2023. Registration for this event will be available soon.
Our Special Interest Groups continue to work diligently to provide valuable resources for our members. For example, members of our Clinical Nurse Scientist SIG, have collaborated on developing a toolkit for nurse scientists in the clinical setting. In addition to these ongoing projects, we look forward to the announcement of two additional webinars hosted by the Early Career and Clinical Nurse Scientist SIGs later this year.
National Research Priorities Update
The National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) recently issued several requests for applications and program announcements to support research to advance health equity, address structural racism, target co-morbidities and health disparities, among several others (
National Institute of Nursing Research, 2023
).National Institute of Nursing Research. (2023). Research Funding Opportunities. https://www.ninr.nih.gov/researchandfunding/fundingopportunities.
In addition, program announcements for early stage investigator grants, several training opportunities, and several small business innovation and technology transfer grants are also available. We encourage investigators to peruse the NINR website for more information.
CANS is incredibly proud of our members and their significant contributions to science. Their research is used to improve health for individuals, families and communities, enhance health systems, advance health equity, and change health policy. We are committed to providing opportunities to share, disseminate, and highlight your work so that the voices of nurse scientists can be heard loud and clear. Wishing you all a healthy and productive start to 2023!
Reference
National Institute of Nursing Research. (2023). Research Funding Opportunities. https://www.ninr.nih.gov/researchandfunding/fundingopportunities.
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