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WHSC Office of Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice announces 2023 project awardees
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The Woodruff Health Sciences Center (WHSC) Office of Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice (IPECP) has announced its 2023 IPECP Project Award recipients. The IPECP Project Awards provide each project team up to $10,000 to conduct work that will expand the development of IPECP innovations that enhance the WHSC strategic plan and foster relationships across WHSC schools and programs.

Initiated in 2019 as the IPECP Synergy Awards, the program was paused during the pandemic, with the 2023 projects the first to be funded since 2020. The Office of IPECP assumed the administration of the awards program when it launched in March 2022 and renamed the program to avoid confusion with the WHSC Synergy Research Awards. 

“We are pleased to be able to relaunch the IPECP Project Awards program this year as part of our new WHSC Office of IPECP. The IPECP Project Awards provide WHSC faculty with the opportunity to create new or refine existing interprofessional programs across Emory’s three health professional schools and with our health care partners. The goal of these awards is to make a positive impact on the health of the communities that WHSC serves,” says Beth Ann Swan, co-director of the Office of IPECP.

All regular WHSC faculty are eligible to apply for IPECP Project Awards, and project teams must include members from two or more WHSC academic degree programs. The 2023 awards were required to be connected to one or more of the five Office of IPECP essential pillars:

  1. faculty development
  2. student curriculum and learning opportunities
  3. research
  4. simulation and
  5. clinical practice

This is a competitive awards program, with two reviewers assessing each proposal followed by discussion and consideration by the full Office of IPECP Advisory Committee.

“We were very pleased with the innovative proposals we received from faculty across the WHSC this year. We are excited to see these projects develop and support this IPECP work at Emory,” says Jodie Guest, who serves as co-director of the WHSC Office of IPECP with Swan. “Our next call for proposals will focus on student engagement as we expand IPECP work across Emory.”

The Office of IPECP will issue its next IPECP Project Award request for proposals in September 2023. For more information on the awards program and the office, visit the WHSC Office of IPECP website.


The 2023 IPECP Project Award recipients


Project Title

A Landscape Analysis of Emory’s Perinatal Survival Footprint: Collaboration to Advance Equitable Survival of Mothers and Newborns in Georgia and Around the World

Our project aims to bring together perinatal equity scholars and advocates across the Emory and greater Atlanta communities. We seek to facilitate collaboration and action to address neonatal and maternal mortality in Georgia and around the world. We will do this through conducting a survey to identify researchers and advocates in the perinatal equity space and assess their unmet academic needs. We will then work with identified scholars to develop a research symposium event on World Prematurity Day (11/17/23) featuring keynote speakers, poster sessions, multidisciplinary simulations, and networking opportunities.” — Shubha Setty, project principal investigator

Project Team

  • Shubha Setty, MD,MPH, assistant professor, Division of Neonatology, School of Medicine (principal investigator)
  • Brittany Murray, MD, MPhil, associate professor, Division of Pediatrics, School of Medicine
  • Tracey Bell, DNP, clinical assistant professor, Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing
  • Abebe Gebremariam, MD, assistant professor, School of Nursing
  • John Cranmer, DNP, MPH, MSN, associate professor, School of Nursing and Rollins School of Public Health
  • Jennifer Goedken, MD, associate professor, Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, School of Medicine
  • Amy Rule, MD, MPH, assistant professor, Divisions of Neonatology and Hospital Medicine, School of Medicine


Project Title

Interprofessional Education for Health Professional Students in the Classroom and in Community Engagement (Extension of 2019 IPECP Synergy Award that was postponed due to COVID-19)

“We are excited to have the support to add curriculum to increase the interaction and collaboration between physician assistant and nursing students through interprofessional classroom engagement and co-teaching of skills that will then be used to improve the health of migrant farmworkers as part of the Emory Farmworker Project. This concept was originally awarded as part of the 2019 IPECP Synergy Awards program but was postponed due to the pandemic.” — Jodie Guest, project principal investigator and co-director of the Office of IPECP

Project Team

  • Jodie L. Guest, PhD, MPH, professor of epidemiology and senior vice chair, Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health; associate program director, Emory PA Program, School of Medicine; director, Emory Farmworker Project; co-director, WHSC Office of IPECP (principal investigator)
  • Angela Hayne-Ferere, DNP, MPH, program director, Distance Accelerated BSN; assistant clinical professor, School of Nursing
  • Kathy Forte, MSN, RN, clinical instructor, School of Nursing
  • Ann Horrigan, PhD, RN, associate clinical professor, School of Nursing


Project Title

Neurocritical Care Simulation Education for Advanced Practice Providers and Trainees

“Our team is so honored to have received the IPECP Project Award for creating and implementing a comprehensive and equitable neurocritical curriculum for advanced practice providers (APPs) and trainees. Our curriculum will be two-fold: 1) simulation training to provide APPs and trainees with advanced knowledge to manage general and neurologic emergencies, and 2) cardiac and lung ultrasound curriculum to encourage more utilization in the neurocritical care. The simulation-based training will incorporate multidisciplinary teams to foster skills including communication, collegiality, and teamwork. Simulation and point-of-care ultrasound are both increasingly recognized as emerging tools in advanced medical education and clinical practice, so we are excited to bring these facets to our growing neurocritical care department.” Erika Sigman, project principal investigator

Project Team

  • Erika Sigman, MD, assistant professor of neurology and neurosurgery, School of Medicine (principal investigator)
  • Catherine S.W. Albin, MD, assistant professor of neurology and neurosurgery, School of Medicine
  • Erica Perets, NP, acute care nurse practitioner, Grady Memorial Hospital
  • Kathleen Chester, PharmD, clinical pharmacist specialist in neurocritical care and director of the PGY-2 Neurology Pharmacy Residency Program, Grady Memorial Hospital
  • Liang Liu, MD, assistant professor of emergency medicine and director of graduate medical education ultrasound curriculum, School of Medicine and Grady Memorial Hospital


Project Title

Transforming Interprofessional Education through Student Hotspotting: An Experiential Approach to Interprofessional Training and Collaboration

Through the support of the IPECP Project Award, we are excited to promote equitable interprofessional education (IPE) for graduate students across Atlanta. This award will allow us to provide experiential IPE by addressing barriers that prevent students from participating in the Atlanta Interprofessional Student Hotspotting (AISH) and to conduct evaluations to improve the quality of our IPE program. We believe that experiential IPE will best prepare students for their careers ahead and this IPECP award represents a critical investment in ensuring meaningful and accessible IPE for all students.” — Sara Turbow and Bethany Robertson, project co-principal investigators

Project Team

  • Sara Turbow, MD, MPH, associate professor and residency program associate director, School of Medicine (co-principal investigator)
  • Bethany Robertson, DNP, CNM, professor, clinical track; InEmory program director, School of Nursing (co-principal investigator)
  • Hannah Marcovitch, student, School of Medicine and School of Public Health
  • Max Brady, student, School of Medicine
  • Camille Murray, student, School of Public Health
  • Jared Beyersdorf, PhD, student, School of Medicine
  • Roshan Modi, student, School of Medicine


Project Title

Validation of a Short Measure of Collaboration and Teamwork in the Healthcare Setting 

“For my IPECP Project Award, I plan to test a short survey that can be used to measure the perception of interprofessional teamwork. The instrument is a modification of a longer measure that we adapted for use in our prior IPECP study testing a wellbeing intervention with Emory Healthcare workers. Short but valid measures are helpful for both research projects (reducing respondent burden) and improving work (that relies on quick but relevant data for feedback), which is an ingoing endeavor for interprofessional teams.” — Ingrid Duva, project principal investigator

Project Team

  • Ingrid Duva, PhD, RN, assistant clinical professor, School of Nursing (principal investigator)
  • Marianne Baird, MD, RN, Magnet Program director, Emory Dekalb Hospitals
  • Melinda Higgins, PhD, research professor, statistician, School of Nursing
  • Laura Kimble, PhD, RN, associate dean for academic operations, School of Nursing
  • David Lawson, MD, professor, Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology, School of Medicine/Winship Cancer Institute

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