Dr. Kathleen Dracup Receives Heart Failure Society of America Lifetime Achievement Award

BOSTON, Sept. 19, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The Heart Failure Society of America (HFSA) announced today that Dr. Kathleen Dracup, Dean and Endowed Professor in Nursing Education at University of California – San Francisco,  is the recipient of the Society's 2011 Lifetime Achievement Award. The award will be presented to Dr. Dracup at the Opening Plenary Session of the HFSA 15th Annual Scientific Meeting, Sept. 18-21, 2011 at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston, Massachusetts.

"The HFSA's Lifetime Achievement Award is given each year to a clinician or researcher who has advanced the awareness and treatment of heart failure throughout their career," said Dr Barry Massie, President, HFSA.  "Dr. Dracup has made many significant contributions to the field of heart failure and we are honored to present her with this award."

Dr. Dracup received her nursing training at St. Xavier's College and the University of California, where she earned her doctorate in 1978.  She was quickly appointed chair of the Medical-Surgical department at the UCLA School of Nursing in 1983. Since then, she has held many administrative and clinical roles within the University of California system including associate dean, professor, and clinical nurse specialist at the UCLA Medical Center, where she and Dr. Lynne Stevenson founded one of the nation's largest heart failure clinics.

Dr. Dracup's first major paper was published in Nursing Research in 1978, and she has since been a major force in clinical nursing over the last 30 years.  She has been published in peer-reviewed journals over 200 times, along with reviews, books and book chapters. Dr. Dracup has also served as reviewer and editor to several professional journals including Heart and Lung, Circulation, and the American Journal of Cardiology.

In addition to teaching and mentoring, Dr. Dracup has also completed hundreds of hours of research related to heart failure and cardiac disease. Her research career has focused on studies related to the care of patients with chronic cardiac disease and the effects of such disease on the family. Dr. Dracup's early work focused on identifying the specific needs of spouses of critically ill cardiac patients, and tested nursing interventions formulated and implemented within the acute coronary care unit setting to meet these needs. Throughout her research program, she has continued to test specific interventions derived from the social support literature, i.e., conjugal groups in a cardiac rehabilitation setting, and intervention programs for family members of patients at high-risk for sudden death such as CPR training. Currently, Dr. Dracup is studying heart failure symptom identification and management.

The purpose of the HFSA Lifetime Achievement Award, given at the HFSA Annual Scientific Meeting, is to recognize an individual who has made a significant and sustained contribution to the field of heart failure in terms of its scientific understanding, epidemiology or clinical care, or for his or her exemplary leadership and inspiration to others, resulting in an important impact on the field.

About Heart Failure

Heart failure is a progressive condition in which the heart muscle becomes weakened after it is injured, most commonly from heart attack or high blood pressure, and gradually loses its ability to pump enough blood to supply the body's needs. Many people are not aware they have heart failure because the symptoms are often mistaken for signs of getting older. Heart failure affects 4.6 to 4.8 million individuals in the United States. Demographic and clinical evidence strongly suggests that the prevalence of heart failure will increase throughout the next decade. Ten to 15 years ago heart failure was considered a "death sentence;" however, recent advances in treatment have shown that early diagnosis and proper care in early stages of the condition are key to slowing, stopping or in some cases reversing progression, improving quality of life, and extending life expectancy. For more information on heart failure, please visit www.abouthf.org.

About the Heart Failure Society of America

The Heart Failure Society of America (HFSA) is a nonprofit educational organization, founded in 1994 as the first organized association of heart failure experts. The HFSA provides a forum for all those interested in heart function, heart failure research and patient care. The Society also serves as a resource for governmental agencies (FDA, NIH, NHLBI, CMS). The HFSA Annual Scientific Meeting is designed to highlight recent advances in the development of strategies to address the complex epidemiological, clinical and therapeutic issues of heart failure. Additional information on HFSA can be found at www.hfsa.org.

SOURCE The Heart Failure Society of America