As a fourth-year doctoral student, Ms. Morgan is exploring inner strength in persons newly diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment along with their care partners. Her dissertation Chair is Dr. Nancy Hodgson along with Committee Members Dr. Lauren Massimo and Dr. Sharon Ravitch. Brianna’s dissertation work is supported by a National Institute of Nursing Research, Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (F31NR020140-01). Ms. Morgan is an active member of the NewCourtland Center for Transitions and Health based at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) School of Nursing. She is a Research Fellow with Drs. Mary Naylor and Karen Hirschman in a Multisite Replication of the Transitional Care Model (TCM), a clinical trial testing the implementation and efficacy of the TCM. Brianna is also involved in a number of projects within Dr. Nancy Hodgson’s program of research including designing and implementing an advance care planning website for persons with dementia. In recognition of her scholarly pursuits and career development to date, she was appointed as an Associate Fellow of the Leonard Davis Institute and a Clark Scholar at the Penn Memory Center.
Ms. Morgan has cultivated a strong foundation towards an independent, academic research career. She worked as a Research Specialist at the FrontoTemporal Degeneration (FTD) Center, in the Perelman School of Medicine, following completion of her first Bachelor’s degree in the Biological Basis of Behavior at Penn. She also worked as a Research Assistant—while completing the accelerated Bachelor of Science in Nursing program—where she examined caregiver stress, and the perceived burden of chronic disease in older adults with multimorbidity. After completing her Nursing preparation, she began her clinical career in the Neuro-Trauma ICU at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. During this time, she completed a cross-sectional study examining moral distress in critical care nurses. She then worked as a Clinical Research Nurse Coordinator, providing clinical care and coordinating clinical trials at the FTD Center while completing the Master of Science in Nursing in Adult and Gerontological Primary Care program. Ms. Morgan also worked as a Geriatric and Palliative Care Nurse Practitioner at Pennsylvania Hospital’s Abramson Cancer Center (ACC). In this role, she acquired additional training on quality improvement, completed multiple studies of quality and quality improvement projects and served as the Quality Improvement Coordinator for the ACC.
Ms. Morgan is a member of the Hospice and Palliative Nurse Association, the American Association of Nurse Practitioners and the is the Vice-Chair Elect of the Emerging Scholars and Professionals Organization in the Gerontological Society of America. Additionally, Ms. Morgan was the course director for a graduate program class on Health Care in an Aging Society for three years and currently guest lectures in a number of courses across all of the academic programs in Penn Nursing.