These are the stories behind the University of New Haven’s newest school — one that prepares students not only for the healthcare careers in demand today, but for the healthcare opportunities of the future.
If becoming a solar photovoltaic installer — the fastest-growing profession from 2016 to 2026, as projected by
the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics — is not
necessarily in your five-year plan, don't fret. You still have options.
Enter: Health Services.
Jobs in the Health Services field — medical assistant, nursing
assistant, and home health aide, for example — are expected to
grow 19% by 2024, faster than most other professions. By 2025, the
U.S. healthcare system is expected to account for one fifth of the
national economy.
In Connecticut, health-related careers are expected to be
the third-largest occupational sector by 2024, with over 30,000
healthcare jobs expected to be added. Of those, 42.6% will be in
south-central and southwest Connecticut.
Summer McGee, PH.D., CPH, Dean of School of Health Sciences
Summer McGee, Ph.D., CPH foresaw greater opportunities in
health services as far back as 2015, when she served as chair of the
University of New Haven’s Department of Health Sciences. "I’m a
builder," Dr. McGee says. "I envision something incredible existing
where before there was nothing. I’m constantly looking to shape or
form or create something new that can stand the test of time."
"I’m a builder. I envision something incredible existing where before there was nothing. I’m constantly looking to shape or form or create something new that can stand the test of time."Summer McGee, PH.D., CPH, Dean of School of Health Sciences
So McGee spearheaded the creation of the University’s newly
established School of Health Sciences (SHS), which officially opened for business this fall, with McGee as the founding dean.
The University’s newest school is the culmination of nearly three
years of collaboration and planning by more than 25 faculty
members across all schools and colleges at the University. Their
strategizing took place in a University-wide "virtual" department,
the Department of Health Sciences, which existed outside of any
single school or college and served as the home for the creation
of new health-related degrees, research collaboration, and student
support, among other services.
School of Health Sciences At A Glance
SHS comprises three University departments — Allied Health,
Nutrition Sciences, and Health Administration and Policy — as
well as the University’s programs in Dental Hygiene , Healthcare
Administration , Health Sciences , Nutrition and Dietetics , and Paramedicine . There will be 12 full-time faculty members, more
than 30 clinical faculty members, and more than 400 undergraduate and graduate students, in addition to doctoral candidates.
A nationally recognized expert in health policy, management,
and bioethics, McGee joined the University of New Haven in 2013.
She has also been recognized as a "Woman of Innovation" by the
CT Technology Council’s 2017 Women of Innovation program.
A Leap of Faith
It was this creative will that helped
her push through the more difficult phases of bringing the School of
Health Sciences to life.
"The term innovation is more
than a buzzword," McGee says.
"It’s a state of being. Challenges,
whether social, organizational,
or cultural, are opportunities for
creation and growth. You need
to flip the script and see solutions
where, previously, others have
only seen problems."
This mindset has resulted in
some lofty goals. McGee and the
SHS faculty aim to build a robust
core curriculum across all health related programs at the University
committed to inter-professional
education; provide facilities and
experiences that allow for real-world
experiences; and grow health
sciences program enrollments
to 15% of the University’s total
enrollment in five years (the
equivalent of nearly 1,000 students).
McGee notes that she aims for
90% of program graduates to be
employed in the sector or enrolled
in graduate programs within a year
of graduating, and to attain a 100%
board passage rate for licensed
health programs.
"Creating SHS has been a leap
of faith on the part of our students,
faculty, and staff," McGee says.
"President Kaplan and the Board
of Governors are counting on us to
put the University of New Haven
on the map for health professions
education. And now, we’re here.
And all we need to do is jump."
Despite the chaos and complexity
of bringing this dream to
life, McGee keeps it simple.
"I can boil the mission and
vision of SHS down to two words:
growth and excellence," she says.
"The SHS faculty live and breathe
this ideal. They don’t think: What
do we currently have in front of us?
They think: What are we missing?
They are passionate about their
discipline and wholly dedicated
to their students."
Faculty Highlights
Here you will read just a few of a multitude of faculty stories that helped shape
the vision for the future of health sciences at the University of New Haven.
Renee Garcia-Prajer, R.D.H., M.S. Assistant Dean Associate Professor Recognition
The Dental Hygiene program at the University
of New Haven offers students two experiential
internship opportunities — one working
with the Navajo Nation in Arizona, and the
other in Prato, Italy.
Garcia-Prajer, who
developed both
internships, says that
these roughly two week-long trips help
students hone their
skills while also deepening their appreciation
of different cultures.
There’s a significant need for dental services
among the Navajos; students have full
schedules throughout their stay providing
preventive dental hygiene services, including
the placement of pit and fissure sealants. In
Prato, Tuscany’s second-largest city, students
work with a local ambulance company,
mentor first-year dental hygiene students
at the University of Siena in the fundamentals
of instrumentation, and assist in community
and private dental practice settings.
Graduates are becoming dental hygiene
program directors, oral health consultants,
dental therapists, and even entrepreneurs.
"A dental hygienist," Garcia-Prajer says, "isn’t
just someone who works for a dentist and
cleans teeth. There’s so much more to it."
Donald Stankus Jr., M.S., R.D. LECTURER INNOVATION
Stankus’ clinical work in the oncology
department at St. Vincent’s Medical Center
in Bridgeport, Connecticut, speaks volumes
about the growing importance of registered
dieticians.
In this role, he handles everything from
intravenous feeding tubes to bimonthly
cooking classes. In a new initiative, he’s
helping to launch one of the country’s first
"prehab" programs for liver and pancreatic
cancer patients, working as part of a team to
prepare them nutritionally, physically, and
psychologically for surgery and radiation
treatment.
Having the
Nutrition program
in the School of
Health Sciences,
he says, will
make it easier to
train students
for these varied
roles. One of the projects
he’s working on at the University is setting
up hospital-based nutrition assessment labs
where students will work directly with patients,
both from the University and the local community,
on a regular basis.
"Students need to know how to make
healthy meals that also taste good," says
Stankus. As a former personal chef, he’ll
make sure of that.
Mary P. Griskewicz, M.S. ’95, FMISS ADJUNCT FACULTY PRINCIPAL EXPERIENCE
Digital health, which encompasses everything
from the latest fitness apps to new
blockchain technology dealing with storing
and accessing patient health records, will
be a critical area of focus in the School of
Health Sciences’ curriculum.
Griskewicz, who earned her master’s in
industrial relations, is a sought-after authority
in the health sciences field, having held health
information technology leadership roles with
insurers Aetna, Cigna,
General Electric,
New Haven’s Hospital
of Saint Raphael,
and the Healthcare
Information and
Management Systems Society.
As a lobbyist for GE and HIMSS,
Griskewicz helped secure billions of dollars
in federal funding to promote the U.S.
healthcare system’s transition to portable
electronic health records, an enormous
logistical and policy challenge that’s still
very much a work in progress. "We’re still not
there yet," Griskewicz says, "but there’s new
innovations coming out every single day."
In June, Griskewicz launched Summer
Hill Associates, a consulting firm based in
Madison, Connecticut, focused on patient
advocacy and patient-centered IT strategies.
Peter J. Struble, M.P.A. LECTURER, PARAMEDICINE COORDINATOR
EXPERIENCE
As Struble explains it, the looming "silver
tsunami" of aging Baby Boomers is going to
make it increasingly difficult to get a hospital
bed. As a result, paramedics will need to be
equipped to manage cases in the field, so
patients who don’t truly need to be seen in
the emergency room can stay where they
are or get care elsewhere.
It’s a concept called "integrated mobile
healthcare," and it will require major changes
in the way paramedics are trained.
The Paramedicine program Struble
helped spearhead six years ago at the
University of New Haven is well positioned to
meet this challenge. It’s one of only a handful
in the United States that offers a four-year
baccalaureate degree. He believes that moving
formally in 2019 to the School of Health
Sciences will
only make
the program
stronger.
In Struble’s
day, paramedics
didn’t need a
college degree,
but that’s where the profession is headed.
"They’re in the field by themselves and
basically bringing the emergency room to the
living room," Struble says. "There’s so much
for them to know."
Rachael A. Petitti, Ph.D., LCSW LECTURER
UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAM DIRECTOR AND FACULTY ADVISOR
EXPERIENCE
It’s a deeply troubling statistic: People with
serious mental illnesses live 25 years less,
on average, than the general population.
What’s shortening their lives so
dramatically? "They don’t go to the doctor,"
Dr. Petitti says. The reasons for this, she
explains, include
poverty, health
insurance issues,
the debilitating
effects of mental
illnesses such
as schizophrenia
and depression,
and a shortage of primary care physicians.
A former director of mental health
treatment services for the New York City
Department of Health and Mental Hygiene,
who also has extensive experience as a
consultant and top executive in the private
nonprofit sector, Petitti is a leading authority
on integrative programs that aim to address
this public health crisis by combining primary
medical care with behavioral treatment.
There’s a global dimension to her research:
In addition to assessing the impact of recent
federal funding cuts on integrative programs
in the United States, she’s also looking at how
other countries handle these same types of
behavioral health challenges in terms of service
delivery models for this specialized group.