MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Two WVU Medicine nursing leaders – Melanie M. Heuston, D.N.P., R.N., N.E.A.-B.C., chief nurse executive, and Lya M. Stroupe, D.N.P., A.P.R.N., C.P.N.P.-P.C., N.E.A.-B.C., N.P.D.-B.C., director of nursing professional practice and education – have been selected for the Johnson & Johnson Nurse Innovation Fellowship Program (JJNIF), powered by Penn Nursing and the Wharton School.
Drs. Heuston and Stroupe are one of the 10 two-person teams from health systems around the country that have been selected for the ground-breaking, one-year, team-based nursing fellowship for chief nursing officers, nurse executives, and senior nurse leaders.
“We are incredibly proud of Melanie and Lya for being selected for this prestigious fellowship program,” Albert L. Wright, Jr., president and CEO of the WVU Health System, said. “Not only am I confident that they will represent WVU Medicine well, but I am sure that they will bring about real change to improve the care that we provide to all those who seek us out for care.”
The fellowship is unique in that two nurse leaders – one chief nursing officer or nurse executive and one other senior nurse leader from the same organization – participate and work together to address a real-world challenge their health system is facing using human-centered design and business and leadership principals specific to innovation.
The fellows come from geographically diverse areas from across the U.S. They come from large and small health systems as well as stand-alone hospitals and public health systems in urban and rural locations.
The fellowship will immerse participants in the innovation process by focusing on human-centered design and design thinking methodologies and will teach fellows how to apply it to their specific challenge area. The innovation curriculum provided by Penn Nursing will be paired with business acumen, change management, and strategic leadership skills development through Wharton Executive Education. At the conclusion of the fellowship, fellows will pitch their innovative solutions with the goal of bringing that solution back to their healthcare system to implement.
During the fellowship, participants will work on a healthcare problem specific to their health system. While two-person executive leadership teams from each health system are the selected fellows, fellows may invite extended team members from their health system who can help them identify the problem and develop their solutions to attend virtual sessions as well. The program will conclude with a final in-person pitch session where fellows will describe the problem they are addressing and their recommended solution.
The program begins with a virtual half-day kick-off meeting in early June, followed by an in-person five-day Summer Innovation Institute at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, from June 26-30. Following that there are three, two-day virtual synchronous sessions (one each quarter) throughout the year and a two-day in-person closing event at Johnson & Johnson’s headquarters in New Brunswick, New Jersey, in May 2024.
