Press Release

Grant Awarded: Collaborative Care to Enhance Patient Care

The ASHP Foundation is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2024 Collaborative Care Grant for Nurses and Pharmacists. The competitive grant program, offered in partnership with the American Nurses Foundation, supports innovative projects co-led by nursing and pharmacy to stimulate and demonstrate the impact of team-based care that enhances the safe and effective use of medications. 

The 2024 recipients are Dana Burns, DNP, FNP-BC, BC-ADM, and Evan M. Sisson, PharmD, MSHA, BCACP, CDCES, for their proposal, “Feasibility Study for the Comprehensive Overweight/Obesity Management Pre-Kidney Transplant (COMPKT) Program.” 

According to Burns and Sisson, “Approximately 30% of patients waiting for a kidney transplant at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Health System have delayed evaluation for the procedure because they have a Body Mass Index (BMI) greater than 35 kg/m2, putting them at high risk for serious comorbid health complications and poor post-transplant outcomes, and those with a BMI greater than 40 kg/m2 are not eligible to proceed.” 

This project expands the team with a clinical pharmacist, a family nurse practitioner, and a dietitian in the VCU Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism that will create a treatment program to reduce these patients’ BMI using medications for weight loss, patient education, and technology tools for making healthy lifestyle choices. 

“The ASHP Foundation congratulates Dr. Burns and Dr. Sisson as the 2024 recipients of the Collaborative Care Research Grant,” said Steven A. Rubloff, chief executive officer of the ASHP Foundation. “Their research will ensure a patient’s eligibility for a kidney transplant and improve their health outcomes, post-transplant and beyond. Obesity is a chronic condition that affects a significant portion of the population. Therefore, the findings and insights from this research could have a broader impact on patient care." 

“On behalf of the American Nurses Foundation, I am honored to congratulate this year’s recipients of the Collaborative Care Grant for Nurses and Pharmacists," said Adriane K. Griffen, DrPH, MPH, MCHES^®, interim executive director and vice president of programs at the American Nurses Foundation. "The work of Dr. Sisson and Dr. Burns is both inspiring and revolutionary. Together, they created an innovative solution to dangerous comorbidities that impact a patient’s ability to receive lifesaving treatment. I am excited to see how they will use this grant to continue their research and expand the utilization of this program. This is going to make a considerable, positive impact on many lives in the foreseeable future." 

Burns is a clinical associate professor at the VCU School of Nursing and an affiliate faculty member at the School of Pharmacy. As the director of practice-based interprofessional education (IPE) with the VCU Center for IPE and Collaborative Care, she has collaborated with several health science teaching institutions to help create innovative practice models to meet the needs of their unique institutions. With over 25 years as a nurse practitioner, she has worked in mental health, family and primary care, and clinical education. 

Sisson is a professor in the Department of Pharmacotherapy and Outcomes Science at the VCU School of Pharmacy. He has a clinical background in ambulatory care pharmacy practice, with an emphasis on the management of cardiovascular risk factors, including hypertension, dyslipidemia, diabetes, and obesity. His research focuses on the efficacy of team-based care models that incorporate pharmacists in improving cardiovascular risk factors and evaluating the implementation of evidence-based practice. 

Additional information about the grant is available at ashpfoundation.org/CCG.