Susan Grinslade, M.S.N., R.N., assistant professor in the department of chronic nursing, received a Certificate of Appreciation from the Metropolitan Health District Immunization Division recognizing her and her students’ outstanding contributions in supporting public health efforts to promote immunizations and helping to build a healthier community.
Grinslade and nine students from her community health class provided more than 6,000 immunizations in outreach clinics around San Antonio during the fall semester.
Grinslade and her students provided assistance as part of the Racial and Ethnic Adult Disparities in Immunization Initiative, (READII) whose purpose is to raise the influenza and pneumococcal immunization rates of minorities aged 65 and older.
The READII program is funded by a two-year grant from the Department of Health and Human Services through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Immunization Program. San Antonio was one of five cities selected in August 2002 for the project. Other cities involved in the READII project include: Chicago, Milwaukee, Rochester and the Mississippi Delta region. San Antonio was chosen because of its large Hispanic population.
Although the grant was awarded in 2002, it wasn’t until January 2004 that the immunization plan was implemented. Overall, there has been a net gain of 40,000 influenza and pneumococcal immunizations in San Antonio in that time. In 2001, 84 percent of influenza and pneumonia related deaths in Texas occurred among people aged 65 and older.
Grinslade earned a bachelor of science in nursing, a master of science in education and a master of science in nursing education from Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville. She is a doctoral candidate at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She received an Army Nurse Corps Scholars Grant Award in 2002, the Epsilon Eta Chapter of Sigma Theta Tau Writing for Publication Award in 1999 and the Edna Malen Scholarship Award in 1998. She is the treasurer of the Delta Alpha chapter of Sigma Theta Tau.
