Community Health

Dr. Jung-Ah Lee with students

Community health is a blend of primary health care and nursing practice with public health nursing to provide care that is preventive, curative and rehabilitative. The philosophy of care is based on the belief that care directed to the individual, the family and the group contributes to the health care of the population as a whole. Students choosing this focus will have an opportunity to study the development of community activities that contribute to the promotion of, education about and maintenance of good health. These activities require comprehensive health programs that pay special attention to social and ecological influences and specific populations at risk.

Faculty Experts in This Area

Nakia Best
PhD, RN, Assistant Professor

School Health, Data Analytics, Social Determinants Of Health, Health Disparities, Mixed-Methods

Recent Studies/Projects

Websites

Dawn Bounds, PhD, PMHNP-BC, FAAN, Associate Professor

Dawn Bounds
PhD, PMHNP-BC, FAAN, Associate Professor

Marginalized Youth, Adolescence, Risk, Resilience, Commercial Sexual Exploitation, Social Media, Mental Health, Integrative Health, Wearable And Biofeedback Technology

Recent Studies/Projects
The THRIVE Study
Project REVIVE

Websites
The THRIVE Study
Project REVIVE

Christopher Cleary
DNP, PMHNP-BC, Assistant Clinical Professor

Care Collaboration, Shared Decision Making in Mental Health, LGBTQ Health Care Disparities, Neurodiversity, Psychotherapy, and Health Care Systems

Recent Studies/Projects

Websites

Michelle A. Fortier
PhD, Professor

Pediatric Pain, Pediatric Oncology, Healthcare Disparities, mHealth

Recent Studies/Projects
Pain Buddy Treating Pain in Children with Cancer: A 21st Century Innovative Approach – This multi-site randomized controlled trial is aimed to examine the effectiveness of Pain Buddy, a mobile health (mHealth) application designed to improve pain and symptom management in children undergoing treatment for cancer. Pain Buddy allows for real time reporting and management of pain and symptoms as well as training in evidence-based pain management strategies. The long-term goal of Pain Buddy is to improve the quality of life for children facing a cancer diagnosis.

Children Impacted by Cancer in the Latinx Community – The purpose of this study is to conduct community based participatory research (CBPR) with Spanish-speaking families with a child with cancer in order to develop a culturally grounded palliative care model for Latinx families. 

Intervention Development and Evaluation to Reduce Disparities in Quality of Life for Latinx Families Impacted by Cancer – The purpose of this study is to develop and validate an innovative culturally grounded intervention to improve quality of life and well-being for Spanish-speaking families impacted by childhood cancer. This intervention, Corazones, includes a focus on health literacy, culturally responsive care, and family well-being and incorporates complementary and alternative medicine (acupressure, massage), culinary medicine, and gardening to improve quality of life during cancer treatment.

Palliative Care in Oncology – The purpose of this study is to understand general palliative care knowledge, beliefs, use, and needs among children and families in the oncology setting.  We are also interested in learning about symptoms experienced by children and family beliefs about medication and complementary and alternative approaches to pain and symptom management.  

Transition of Care: Assessing for Readiness – About half of young adults do not transition to adult providers to receive follow-up care during cancer survivorship.  Accordingly, the purpose of this study is to better understand the experiences of adolescent cancer survivors as they prepare to transition from pediatric oncology care to adult care and to identify and address gaps that may improve the transition process.

Websites
Center on Stress and Health

Yuqing Guo
PhD, RN, FAAN, Associate Professor

Reduction of Maternal And Child Health Disparities, Mind-Body Intervention, Technology-Based Intervention, Health Promotion, Infant Mental Health, Family Dynamics, Community-Based Participatory Research, Mixed Methods

Recent Studies/Projects>
SHERO: A Tech-Enabled Community Based Perinatal Initiative to Advance Equity in New Orleans, LA
The Black PEARL (Promoting Equity Anti-Racism and Love) Model: Systemic Integration of Community Maternal Support Services to Achieve Birthing Justice, Equity, and Joy for BIPOC Families
UCLA-UCI Center for Eliminating Cardio-Metabolic Disparities in Multi-Ethnic Populations (UC END-DISPARITIES) – Investigator Development Core
SCH: Individualized learning and prediction for heterogeneous multimodal data from wearable devices
Irvine Summer Institute for Biostatistics and Undergraduate Data Science

Websites

Paola German
DNP, FNP-C, Clinical Instructor

Vaccinations, Healthcare Education and Awareness, Preventative Healthcare, Underserved Communities, Healthcare Access, Efficiency

Recent Studies/Projects
Beyond 4-VAX
Co-leaders: Paola German DNP, FNP-C, Albert Chang MD, MPH, Suellen Hopfer, PhD

Websites

E. Alison Holman
PhD, APRN, FNP, FAAN, Professor

Acute Stress; Health Effects of Individual & Collective Trauma; Media Exposure; Intergenerational Transmission of Trauma in Minoritized Communities; Race and Discrimination in Nursing; Temporal Disintegration; Time Perception

Recent Studies/Projects
Promoting Compassion & Health Equity: Pathways for Minority Nurse Scientists

Websites

Mark Lazenby
PhD, APRN, FAAN, Dean and Professor

Psycho-Oncology, particularly Spiritual Well-Being; End-Of-Life Care; Health Care Ethics; and Thinking About Nursing’s Contribution to A Good Society

Recent Studies/Projects
NURSE-OC: University of California, Irvine Nursing Workforce Pipeline through Externships and Residencies in Orange County (OC)

Websites

Jung-Ah Lee
PhD, RN, FGSA, FAAN Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging, Professor and PhD Program Director

Adults/Older Adults and Caregivers, Health Equity/Disparity, Health Technology, Self-Management, Integrative Health, Transition Care, Venous Thromboembolism, Patient Safety, Clinical and Systems Outcomes, Cost-Effectiveness in Healthcare, Mixed Methods

Recent Studies/Projects
UCI Dementia Family Caregiver Study
Addressing Race-Based Limitations of Pulse Oximetry Using Spectrophotometry

Websites
UCI Dementia Family Caregiver Study

Adey Nyamathi
PhD, ANP, FAAN, Distinguished Professor, Founding Dean Emerita

HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, Hepatitis, Vulnerable Populations Including Previously Incarcerated, Homeless, Rural Women of India and Gay/Bisexual Youth

Recent Studies/Projects
Establishing the Foundations of Emotional Intelligence of Care Companion Robots to Mitigate Agitation among High Risk Dementia Patients via Empathic Patient-Robot Interface, Principal Investigator: A. Nyamathi, ANP, PhD., FAAN; Dutt, N., Ph.D, A, Rahmani, PhD., et al. . UC Noyce Award, $300,000
Secondary Cervical Cancer Prevention of Vulnerable Women with HPV and HIV Co-Infections in India, Principal Investigator: A. Nyamathi, ANP, PhD., V. Satyanarayana, PhD., C. Carpenter, C., PhD. Et al. . R01CA285063. $2,868,674

Websites

Jung In Park
PhD, RN, FAMIA , Assistant Professor

Health Informatics, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Predictive Modeling, Hospital-acquired Conditions, Cancer Research, Health Disparities

Recent Studies/Projects
Exploring Sleep Quality Among Cancer Survivors Using AI and Big Data Analytics
Sleep and Health Disparities among Asian Americans: Roles of Stressors and Protective Factors
Harnessing AI for Early Detection and Prevention of Catheter-associated Urinary Tract Infections (CAUTIs) in Healthcare Settings

Websites
Jung In Park

Amir Rahmani
PhD, Professor

AI/ML in Healthcare, Wearable Computing, mHealth, Health Informatics

Recent Studies/Projects
ZotCare: A Flexible and Personalizable SaaS-based Digital Health Platform-From Human Studdy Trials to Care Delivery
Safeguarding Privacy of Cardiovascular Waveforms through Reinforcement Learning- Guided Generative Models
An LLM-based interactive and Personalized Coaching for Chronic Health Management

Websites

Sanghyuk Shin
PhD, Associate Professor

Infectious Disease Epidemiology, COVID-19, Tuberculosis, TB/HIV Co-Infection, Genomic Epidemiology, Molecular Diagnostics, Community-Based Intervention Trials, Social Determinants, Global Health

Recent Studies/Projects
Improved Understanding of TB Transmission by Accounting for Within-Host Heterogeneity of M. Tuberculosis
The Effect of HIV on SARS-Cov-2 Transmission and Emergence of Variants of Concern

Websites