Lynda Wilson's International Activities

Dr. Lynda wilson has a long-standing interest in global health and international nursing. Since 1995 she has been an active member of Alabama-Guatemala Partners, and served for three years as the president of the Alabama chapter. This organization is a chapter of the international organization called partners of the Americas, which was established in the 1960s by President John Kennedy as a strategy to promote people-to-people understanding in the hemisphere. From 1996-1998 Dr. Wilson was one of 40 participants selected to participate in an International Leadership Development Program sponsored by Partners of the Americas and funded by the W. W. Kellogg Foundation. Dr. Harrison is fluent in Spanish and has led five study-abroad courses to Guatemala. In addition she has been involved with a number of health and development projects in Guatemala and with the Latino community in Alabama. From 2003-2004 Dr. Wilson spent 6 months as a Visiting Professor at the Catholic University of Chile School of Nursing, with support from the Fulbright foundation. Since 2002 she has served as Co-Deputy Director of Deputy Director of the World Health Organization/Pan American Health Organization Collaborating Center on International Nursing at the School of Nursing. Dr. Wilson also coordinates a weekly “Brown Bag Lunch Spanish Discussion Table” at the School of Nursing. In October 2008, she was appointed Assistant Dean for International Programs in the UAB School of Nursing.

Dr. Lynda Wilson, Sandra Hidalgo (from Pan American Health Organization), and community partners participating in Familias Fuertes training, May 18-20, Guntersville, Alabama.

Currently she is working with the Marshall County Latino Health Community Partnership, a volunteer organization that was established in 2005 and that is focused on working to improve the health of Latino immigrants in a rural area of Alabama. Dr. Wilson has received funding from the Southern Agromedicine Institute to conduct focus groups and family-life education programs with Latino families, and received a School of Nursing Dean's award for a needs assessment to gather data to be used in establishing programs to address Latino family health needs in this area. Dr. Wilson has also received funding with two other SON faculty (Dr. Karen Saenz and Dr. Lygia Holcomb) to partner with nursing faculty at the University of Honduras to implement and evaluate a parent/adolescent educational program called "Familias Fuertes" in Honduras. She has also worked with community partners in Marshall County, Alabama, with support from the Washington, D. C. Office of the Pan American Health Organization to train community volunteers to offer this program in rural Alabama.

Some of the publications that focus on Dr. Harrison’s global health work are:

Harrison, L. L. & Malone, K. (2004). A study abroad experience in Guatemala: Learning first-hand about health, education, and social welfare in a low-resource country. International Journal of Nursing Education Scholarship, 1(1). Accessible online at http://www.bepress.com/ijnes/vol1/iss1/art16/.

Harrison, L. L., Hernandez, A. R., Cianelli, R., Rivera, S., Urrutia, M. (2005). Competencias en investigación para diferentes niveles de formación de enfemeras: Una perspectiva latinoamericana. Ciencia y Enfermería, XI(1), 59-71.

Harrison, , L. L., Hernandez, A. R., Cianelli, R., Rivera, S., Urrutia, M. (2005). Perspectives of Latin American nursing professors and leaders about research competencies needed by nurses with different levels of academic preparation" International Journal of Nursing Education Scholarship. Accessible online at: http://www.bepress.com/ijnes/vol2/iss1/art24

Garcés, I. C., Scarinci, I. C., & Harrison, L. (2006). An examination of sociocultural factors associated with health and health care seeking among Latina immigrants. Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health. 8(4),377-85.

Hernández, Al. R., Padilla, O. N. M., & Harrison, L. L. (2006). Perspectivas Sobre la Investigación en Enfermería en Guatemala. Enfermería Globa, Volume 8 (May). (Access at www.um.es/eglobal/8/08c04.html)

Jones, C. T., Jester, P. M., Harrison, L. (2006). Clinical research in low resource countries. Research Practitioner, 7(6), 188-199.

Harrison, L. & Scarinci, I. (2007). Child health needs of rural Alabama Latino families. Journal of Community Health Nursing. 24 (1), 31-47.

Harrison, L., Montenegro, G., Malvares, S., Astudillo, M., Behn, V., Bertolozzi, M. R., Chiesa, A. M., Espinoza, M., Fujimore, E., Harper, D., Orellana, A., Saenz, K., Sigaud, C. H. S., Verissimo, M. D. O. (2008). The network for nursing in child health. Pediatric Nursing. 34(2), 113-116, 138-139.