Introducing Connie Delaney - School of Nursing - University of ...

esearch
Linda Bearinger, PhD, RN, FAAN
• Public health needs of adolescents
• Adolescents’ health education needs for nurses
• Adolescent sexual behavior
• Multiethnic issues in adolescent health
linda bearinger:
pioneering adolescent health
BY MAME OSTEEN
Adolescence can be a rocky and sometimes risky road. When it
comes to health, teenagers’ behavior—rather than disease—is the
major predictor of their survival. Bad choices often send young
people down the path to substance abuse, violence or even death.
Good choices, achieved through guidance, support or early
intervention, can carry them through to successful adulthood.
For the last 10 years, the unique problems associated with
adolescent health have garnered the special study they deserve,
thanks to Linda Bearinger, Professor and Director of the Center for
Adolescent Nursing, in the School of Nursing. The only adolescentspecific
nursing center of excellence in the world, Bearinger and
colleagues are bridging the gap between childhood and adulthood
through groundbreaking research on promoting the health of teens.
The problem is that health strategies that work well for others
often don’t work with adolescents. “They need to be developmentally
tailored,” said Bearinger, “because they’re not little adults, and
as any parent would readily say, they are not children—they have
their own unique style.”
NAVIGATING TROUBLED WATERS
Considering the significant problems facing today’s youth, the quest
for understanding is critical. “Fifty years ago if you asked young
people to name their biggest worries, they answered, getting caught
chewing gum, being late for school and getting good grades,” said
Bearinger. “Today, it’s still getting good grades, but it’s now getting
an STD, HIV, or pregnant, and being a victim of violence.”
The stress kids face shows in the statistics. Car accidents—twothirds
of them alcohol-related—are the leading cause of death
among teenagers. Homicide ranks second, followed by suicide.
Strong personal connections are the key to healthy outcomes,
Bearinger says: “It’s about school, it’s about family, and it’s about
peers, and the way communities offer opportunities for young
people. In fact, if I had to only ask one question—it would be about
connection to school. It’s very powerful in offsetting risk.” Knowing
that promoting strong connections is at the core of kids doing well,
in all aspects of their growing up, Bearinger and colleagues focus
on ways that parents, adults, teachers and youth leaders can
connect effectively with young people during their adolescence.
PLAYING CATCH-UP
Understanding adolescents and passing that knowledge on to
nurses and other health professionals is a major objective of the
center. An adolescent specialty, which now exists in medicine and
psychology, for example, is newer to nursing—and it shows.
Surveys indicate that more than half the country’s nurses feel ill
equipped to address even common adolescent problems. Since the
center was founded in 1993, Bearinger and her adolescent nursing
faculty colleagues have worked hard to alleviate that problem.
“We’re trying to bridge the gap between nurses’ skills and
knowledge and the health problems of youth,” said Bearinger.
As the only federally funded graduate and post-graduate
program focusing on adolescent health for nurses, the center has
expanded knowledge of the field through the research of its
growing faculty and research scientists, who now number six. The
center’s resources support stipends and tuition for its master’s and
doctoral students and post-doctoral research fellows. The center
just welcomed its eighth doctoral student; three graduates who
have joined faculties in schools of nursing are, in turn, teaching
other nurses about effective way to work with teens.
The center’s outreach efforts connect nurses around the country
and around the world to issues in adolescent care. More than a
thousand health care providers worldwide receive the center’s
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