Patients remember the good nursing care they receive when they’re hospitalized. Ken Morehead was so moved by the nursing care he’d received that he donated $1.75 million towards nursing care.
On Feb. 3, the University of Nebraska Medical Center College of Nursing opened the Morehead Center for Nursing Practice, a center named in honor of Morehead which will benefit people across Nebraska.
Morehead, who passed away in 2000, was a University of Nebraska-Lincoln alumnus and former Lincoln and Omaha automobile dealer. He served as a University of Nebraska Foundation trustee and was a longtime supporter of university athletics. He began supporting UNMC and the College of Nursing in 1988 after receiving care at the former University Hospital, now The Nebraska Medical Center.
Kathryn Fiandt, D.N.Sc., associate professor of nursing and interim director of the center, said the center will provide an infrastructure for the coordination, support and development of faculty nursing practices. Housed in the college’s Omaha location at 42nd and Dewey Streets, it will focus on improving the quality of patient care through education, research and outreach to the underserved.
Faculty nursing practices are contracted services for health care provided by nursing faculty typically in community settings, and include in a variety of health services such as primary care, health promotion, helping vulnerable populations gain access to health services and involvement and evaluation of community health projects.
Some services are provided through the college’s nursing centers, which include the Panhandle Hispanic/Native American Diabetes Outreach Clinic in Scottsbluff; the Senior Health Promotion Center in Lincoln; the Family Health Care Center in Omaha; and the Cosmopolitan-UNMC College of Nursing Mobile Nursing Center.
About 25 percent of UNMC nurse faculty have nursing practices, Dr. Fiandt said.
“The Morehead Center for Nursing Practice will help us coordinate our nursing practices, expand our activities, negotiate contracts and market our services. We don’t want to give up our indigent care, so we need profit centers to subsidize them, all the while improving care and increasing access. Up until now, the faculty has had to do it on their own,” Dr. Fiandt said.
“We will have the opportunity to really make an impact on patient care in ways we haven’t been able to do before. Nurses in academia are leaders in terms of evolving nursing practice,” she said. “In education, we have to do research to improve patient care – then take research-based knowledge and apply it in practice.”
Dr. Fiandt said nursing practices help improve the lives of patients with a holistic approach.
“We look at the whole picture and identify problems that could determine the success of the health outcome,” she said. “We have to know where to find resources. Our job isn’t done until they can purchase the medication and take it. If they don’t have a place to sleep and don’t have food, a plan of care probably won’t be effective.
“It’s the idea that you can’t be healthy unless you have safe water, sufficient food. It’s part of what nurses are trained to do,” Dr. Fiandt said. “Our students will have opportunities to use the skills they learn and serve the community in a culturally diverse setting.”
An increase in faculty nursing practices will enable the college to hire more faculty to teach. Currently, the college doesn’t have enough faculty or space to accept all the qualified students who apply to its undergraduate programs across the state.
Virginia Tilden, D.N.Sc., dean of the UNMC College of Nursing, said the gift will make a difference in the lives of patients. “Nurses help people stay well longer and maximize their quality of life once illness befalls them,” she said. “Nursing truly is the science of caring for people.”
Drs. Tilden and Fiandt say college faculty are involved nationally in developing new nursing standards. They see the center as a way to help position the college in becoming a national leader in academic nursing practice models.
“The faculty use creative, innovative models to deliver care to vulnerable populations and have been forward-thinking in incorporating nursing practice into their workload. The center will enable the college to achieve many of its ambitious goals in the pursuit of nursing excellence,” Dr. Tilden said.
Gloria Gross, Ph.D., assistant dean, UNMC College of Nursing West Nebraska Division, said the center will be a boon for faculty and nurses in western Nebraska because it will help put together clinical services that work well and are based on good research. “We will be able to have a data base for unified reports which will help us obtain grant funding for our clinical enterprises. The faculty are especially interested in ways to promote publications related to their clinical work,” she said.
Kris Hansen-Cain, niece of Morehead, said her uncle was always complimentary about the nursing care he received during his lifetime. “I believe he intuitively felt nurses were undervalued for the important services and care they provided across many different health care settings. From a business perspective, he would be very pleased to know his donation will make a positive impact on the community and Nebraska in particular.”
The Morehead gift also enabled the college to established the Kenneth E. Morehead Clinical Professorship in Nursing to help recruit an outstanding scholar in clinical research and training.
A veteran of the Korean War, Morehead built a prosperous automobile dealership with locations in Falls City, Beatrice, Lincoln, Omaha and Kansas City, Mo. He was one of nine members and three generations of the Morehead family to graduate from the University of Nebraska. A long time resident of Falls City and grandson of former Nebraska Gov. John Henry Morehead, Morehead passed away in 2000.