Corazzini Named Fellow of Gerontological Society of America

Kirsten Corazzini, PhD, has been selected as a fellow of the Gerontological Society of America (GSA), the nation’s largest interdisciplinary organization devoted to the field of aging. The status of fellow is an acknowledgment of outstanding and continuing work in gerontology. Fellows are chosen from each of GSA’s four membership sections. Corazzini, who was selected for the Health Sciences section, received formal recognition of her status at a reception on November 15 during GSA’s 65th Annual Scientific Meeting in San Diego, California.

“Dr. Corazzini’s scholarly and scientific contributions have advanced our understanding of how to improve the quality of care of older adults in nursing homes,” said Catherine L. Gilliss, PhD, RN, FAAN, school of nursing dean, Helene Fuld Health Trust Professor of Nursing, and vice chancellor for nursing affairs at Duke University. “Her research has shown that new models of supervision and delegation between licensed nurses and unlicensed paraprofessionals can improve care outcomes, which also has public policy implications for aging services.”

Dr. Corazzini, a social gerontologist, is Associate Professor in the School of Nursing, a core faculty member in Duke's Center of Excellence in Geriatric Nursing Education, and Senior Research Fellow at Duke’s Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development.

Her research focuses on understanding how nursing clinical expertise affects care of older adults through systems-level factors. To that end, she has examined how front-line, licensed and unlicensed nursing staff in long-term care facilities provide care and the effects of these behaviors on patient outcomes, with particular attention to the role of registered nurse clinical leadership in shaping these behaviors. Her work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health/National Institute of Nursing Research, the National Council of State Boards of Nursing, and the Hartford Foundation.

A past member of the North Carolina State Board of Nursing Task Force on LPN Practice, Dr. Corazzini earned a bachelor’s degree in experimental psychology from Bryn Mawr College and a PhD degree in gerontology from the McCormack Graduate School of Policy Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

About DUSON
Duke University School of Nursing (DUSON), as a diverse community of scholars and clinicians, educates the next generation of transformational leaders in nursing, advances nursing science in issues of global import, and fosters the scholarly practice of nursing. In 2011, U.S. News and World Report ranked Duke among the top seven graduate schools of nursing in the nation. The National Institutes of Health awarded $4.3 million in research funding to DUSON (Oct. 1, 2011, through Sept. 30, 2012), making it one of the top 10 nursing schools engaged with NIH-funded research in the nation. The school offers the masters, PhD, and doctor of nursing practice degrees, as well as an accelerated bachelor of science in nursing degree to students who have previously graduated from college. More than 750 students enrolled for fall 2013 classes, one of the largest enrollments in the school's 80-year history.