Mona Newsome Wicks, PhD, RN, FAAN
Professor and Chair
Department of Health Promotion and Disease Prevention
874 Union Ave., Room 335
Memphis, TN 38163
901-448-6250
mwicks@uthsc.edu
Mona Newsome Wicks, PhD, RN, FAAN, received her Associate and Bachelor of Science degrees in nursing from the University of Memphis in 1978 and 1981, respectively. She earned an MSN (medical-surgical nursing) from the University of Tennessee, Memphis (1987) and PhD from Wayne State University (1992). A faculty member in the College of Nursing since 1987, Dr. Wicks mentors students enrolled in the PhD program and teaches DNP and PhD in Nursing Science program courses.
Professional memberships include the American Academy of Nursing (2015 – 2016 Co-chair of Cultural Competence and Health Equity Expert Panel), American and Tennessee Nurses Associations, Council for the Advancement of Nursing Science, Sigma Theta Tau International (Beta Theta chapter at-large), and Southern Nurses Research Society (State Liaison). She is a lifetime member of the Greater Memphis Area Chapter of the American Association of Critical Care Nurses having served as president of this organization from 2001 – 2003. Dr. Wicks served as a permanent member of two National Institutes of Health study sections (2006 – 2012) and as an ad hoc grant reviewer in 2013, 2015, and 2018.
Her research interests include ethnic minority, family caregiver, and women’s health within the context of chronic disease; health promotion/risk reduction; and health disparities. Dr. Wicks is the Memphis-site principal investigator for a National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR)-funded, multi-site intervention study designed to improve asthma outcomes in adolescents with persistent asthma symptoms. She also completed an NINR-funded study that tested if a cognitive behavioral support group reduced depressive and anxiety symptoms in African American women caring for relatives receiving chronic hemodialysis. Dr. Wicks also served as co-investigator for an NIH-funded Exploratory Center of Excellence grant focused on health disparities.
A Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Executive Nurse Fellow alumna (2008-2011), Dr. Wicks was named Outstanding Alumna by the University of Tennessee Health Science Center College of Nursing in 2009. She was selected to Leadership American in 2010 and inducted as an American Academy of Nursing Fellow in November 2010. Dr. Wicks is the recipient of institutional, regional, and national awards for her teaching and mentoring skills and received the Daisy Faculty Award in 2017. She is the author and co-author of 84 published journal articles, newspaper editorials, abstracts, and book chapters and serves on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Nursing Education. Dr. Wicks is also a manuscript reviewer for several nursing and interdisciplinary journals including Nursing Outlook, Research in Nursing and Health, Issues in Mental Health Nursing, the Journal of Nursing Education, and the American Journal of Health Behavior. Her interests include mentoring ethnic minority high school and college students exploring health and science careers. Dr. Wicks previously served as Chair of the Board of Trustees for the Memphis Mental Health Institute, the regional mental health institute for Shelby County and on the Executive Board of Directors of the Tennessee Action Coalition. She currently serves on the Program Advisory Board of the Shelby County Relative Caregivers Program, a Department of Children’s Services program that supports children whose parents are not able to raise them.