Shawn Kneipp and Victoria Soltis-Jarrett Named AANP Fellows

Associate professor Shawn Kneipp and clinical professor Victoria Soltis-Jarrett were selected to become a Fellows of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP). Fellows are nurse practitioner leaders who have made outstanding contributions to clinical practice, research, education, or policy.

Shawn Kneipp, PhD, RN, ANP-BC, APHN-BC, FAANP, conducts research focused on the social, policy, and economic determinants that impact the health of disadvantaged populations, such as individuals who are receiving welfare. In one of her more recent studies, she tested an intervention to reduce health-related barriers to employment for chronically ill women who are receiving welfare through Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). Women who received the intervention, which involved meeting with a public health nurse four times over nine months, gained employment sooner than women who did not receive the intervention. More women in the intervention group attained jobs than those who received traditional care. This intervention was featured in an issue of the Agency for Health Research and Quality Features Innovations Exchange. As an educator, Dr. Kneipp teaches courses across different programs at the SON. She is currently focusing on PhD education and courses related to public health nursing.

Victoria Soltis-Jarrett, PhD, PMHCNS-BC, PMHNP-BC, FAANP, has been an Advanced Practice Registered Nurse (APRN) clinician, educator and researcher for over 25 years and is renowned at the state level, nationally, and internationally. She has served as the psychiatric-mental health APA coordinator for the SON since 2005 and is currently the director of the SON’s psychiatric-mental health nurse practitioner option, the only program of its kind in North Carolina. Through her leadership, Dr. Soltis-Jarrett has secured over $2.5 million dollars of funding from Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) and NC AHEC. This funding has supported the SON to recruit, educate, and mentor nurses from medically underserved counties and health professional shortage areas across North Carolina to be prepared as a psychiatric mental-health NP (PMHNP). The funding has also transformed the PMHNP curriculum, which currently is ranked 4th in the USA according to US News and World Report. Since 2005, 100 new PMHNPs have successfully graduated from the program and the majority are working in underserved counties. Dr Soltis-Jarrett’s most recent HRSA Advanced Practice Nursing Grant funding (2013-2016) continues to focus on increasing the mental health workforce by embedding PMHNPs in primary care and extended care settings. This innovative project will recruit, educate and prepare PMHNPs to provide integrated behavioral health care as well as increase access to mental health care for all North Carolinians. Dr Soltis-Jarrett teaches in the graduate PMHNP option and practices in a variety of settings including offices in Winston-Salem and Durham. She was most recently the President of the International Society for Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurses (ISPN: 2011-2013), the Chair of the NCNA Commission for Advanced Practice Nurses (2011-2013) and has held other leadership positions in her specialty area of PMHN.

Drs. Kniepp and Soltis-Jarrett were inducted during a ceremony at the AANP 29th National Conference in Nashville, TN.