Serving the underserved:

Nursing, Psychology lead multidisciplinary
research aimed at helping people

A professional setting

All told, the facility holds office space for 16 researchers, as well as assigned space for about 60 students and other faculty investigators, including the University’s revered Indians into Psychology Doctoral Education (INPSYDE) program.

There’s also room for a newly established bio-statistician position.  The bio-statistician will concentrate on research data processing and statistical qualitative analysis.

Like many of his fellow UND psychologists, including April Bradley, Tom Petros, Jeff Weatherly, Mike Himle, Doug McDonald, Joelle Ruthig and Jennifer Muehlenkamp, Ferraro will retain his office in Corwin-Larimore, but he’s still looking forward to the brand new research space the NPBRC will provide him.

Before, Ferraro would use several cramped rooms on the fourth floor of Corwin-Larimore — a building that’s approaching 100 years old — for studies on agricultural pesticide exposure on the elderly, as well as other studies on aging, cognition and neuropsychology.

“Every once in a while, a subject would say, ‘Gee, can’t they give you a better space than this?’” Ferraro observed.  “And then there’s the fact that it wasn’t air-conditioned and when you’re on the fourth floor of a building, it heats up pretty quickly.”

“The newness of the new facility, alone, will enhance our research ability,” he said.

The new facility also is equipped with dedicated specialty freezers that can go to minus 80 for storage of blood and urine samples.

Specialty features

“It’s the whole atmosphere.  (In the NPBRC) there is carpeting and chairs that are comfortable, and the table we use isn’t a wooden picnic table or anything like that — it’s a professional setting.”

April Bradley, UND assistant professor of psychology, has submitted two external grants to the NIH in hopes of securing funds for her studies on child forensic interviewing, childhood trauma, nightmares and parent-child relationships, all of which will be aided by specialty features in the NPBRC.

“The new space is particularly important as it will have observation rooms and recording equipment installed, things which I do not currently have,” she said.

Other features in the facility include one-way mirrors, which allow graduate students or other researchers to look into interview spaces to monitor subject testing, and three sleeping rooms, including one lined in copper to prevent electrical interference during testing.  On the second floor, a working slot machine casino lab is set up for gambling addiction research.

NPBRC researchers will investigate questions related to nutritional effects on cognition and flight performance in pilots, diabetes among migrant farm workers, dementia among elderly American Indians, obesity in children, and domestic violence, to name but a few.

Room to grow

The move into the NPBRC by nursing college researchers had an auxiliary benefit for UND’s Recruitment/Retention of American Indians into Nursing (RAIN) program. The nationally renowned program, which recruits and educates American Indian nurses, was confined to a small space within the UND College of Nursing until the NIH grant funded the NPBRC and freed up space for a RAIN expansion and other renovations.

Lindseth quickly credits all who had a hand in the development of the NPBRC, but she saves special recognition for Fawn Behrens-Smith, an architect with UND Facilities Management.  Behrens-Smith served as a link between the University, the NIH and other local design firms, such as Grand Forks’ own EAPC, which were contracted for the NPBRC.

“She would work long hours, and that was on top of everything she was doing as part of her regular duties,” Lindseth said of Behrens-Smith.  “It was Fawn’s work that put us over the top on this project.”

The Northern Plains Behavioral Research Center (NPBRC), a stately three-story structure, is tucked neatly between the University of North Dakota’s College of Nursing building and Corwin-Larimore Hall, home of the Department of Psychology.

Its setting is perfect, since the primary tenants of the facility will be nursing and psychology researchers.

The fact that the facility is even standing at all is a testament to the dedication of people such as Glenda Lindseth, director of research for the nursing college and the primary investigator for the grant that paid for the 30,000-square-foot, $4 million structure.

In 2004, Lindseth got the go-ahead to apply for a piece of $30 million in infrastructure funding that was about to be distributed by the National Institutes of Health.

But there was a catch. UND’s application asked that the typical local match requirement be waived for its project.

‘Outstanding proposal’

James Louviere, principal architectural consultant to the NIH, said that such a waiver was “very rare.”  But after reading the details of the UND application, Louviere said, it was clear that if any project deserved the waiver, it was UND’s.

Louviere said UND’s application scored as an “outstanding proposal” and was the first of 10 projects awarded funding in 2005.  He said the NIH was impressed by the uniqueness of UND’s proposal and the fact that the facility’s research would focus on underserved populations, including the elderly, American Indians, children and migrant workers.

“This new building represents the commitment of so many people who are committed to helping other people,” he said.

Lindseth said a main reason why the application was made in the first place was because UND’s nursing and psychology researchers were running out of space to do even routine studies and still meet federal regulations.

“Researchers didn’t have space for their files, for their subjects’ research information or for their subjects — they didn’t have space for most activities,” Lindseth said.  “We couldn’t even find a closet to put things in.  All we had was a 20-foot by 20-foot room filled with nine filing cabinets, bookcases and a cubicle.”

All the preliminary hard work turned dreams into reality in May 2007, when construction officially began on the NPBRC. The building was dedicated Oct. 9.

The National Institutes of Health granted UND’s proposal a rare waiver of the local match requirement because of the unique nature of the project and its emphasis on research that would focus on underserved populations.

Glenda Lindseth was the author of UND’s successful grant proposal.

All under one roof

Longtime UND nursing professor and gerontology researcher Bette Ide summed up the new digs.

“Having all of your resources all together and having all the people that you work with right there, too, that’s going to be really nice,” she said.

Ric Ferraro, UND Chester Fritz Distinguished Professor of Psychology, said that benefit can’t be overstressed.

“The whole purpose of the facility is to foster collaborative work,” Ferraro said.  “A number of us in psychology already work with the nursing faculty.”

Cindy Anderson, an assistant professor of nursing who specializes in studies on the status of vitamin D in women during preeclampsia, said the new research center has a lot to offer her in terms of research support.  Features like a kitchen may provide new avenues for investigation.

“I hope to eventually use the data from my study to do an intervention study that involves feeding,” Anderson said.  “There are also exam rooms and a clinical lab facility; those are the kinds of things that will be absolutely critical for me in subsequent studies.”