Donna Fick, professor of nursing and co-director of the John A. Hartford Center of Geriatric Nursing Excellence at Penn State, is the first School of Nursing faculty member to be awarded the title of distinguished professor.
In addition to her Penn State faculty appointments, Fick serves as editor of the Journal of Gerontological Nursing and is a Fellow of both the American Academy of Nursing and the Gerontological Society of America. Her awards include the John A. Hartford Geriatric Nursing Research Award from the Eastern Nursing Research Society, the Fran and Holly Soistman Faculty Development Award for Innovation in Health Care from Penn State, and the Springer Award in Geriatric Nursing for Publication in Applied Nursing Research from the Springer Publishing Company.
In 2012, she co-chaired the update of the American Geriatrics Society's Beers Criteria for medications to avoid in older adults. These criteria have been adopted by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid as a Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set (HEDIS) quality measure and incorporated into the electronic medical records at medical centers and HMOs worldwide.
Fick's program of research focuses on improving detection and management of delirium superimposed on dementia in older adults and inappropriate medication use. Her two current research projects, both funded through 2015 by the National Institute of Nursing Research, focus on early nurse detection of delirium superimposed on dementia in the hospital setting, and (with Ann Kolanowski) a single-component cognitive intervention for delirium in post-acute care.