Kristin Corey Magan began with the College in spring 2020
The University of Rhode Island College of Nursing welcomed Assistant Professor Kristin Corey Magan to the college in the spring of 2020. Learn about one of the College’s newest professors.
Education: Ph.D. in nursing, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth; M.S. with a concentration in adult gerontology primary care, University of Pennsylvania; B.S. in nursing, St. Anselm College, Manchester, NH.
Experience: Magan comes to the URI College of Nursing after having completed a two-year stint as a post-doctoral research fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s NewCourtland Center for Transitions and Health. There, she continued work on the dissertation she began at UMass Dartmouth, focusing on the population of former family caregivers of people with dementia. Previously, she served as a nurse practitioner at MedOptions in Old Lyme, CT.; Beacon Hospice in Fall River, MA; and Genesis Physician Services in Kennett Square, PA. She was previously a staff nurse at The Miriam Hospital in Providence, Charlton Memorial Hospital in Fall River, and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
Research focus: Magan is focused on looking at the experience of family caregivers of people with dementia, especially after the death of the care recipient. Most of the research focuses on caregivers while they are actively caring for people with dementia, she said, with less focus on what happens after the person with dementia passes away. “When someone is caring for a person with dementia, they will often experience depression, anxiety, sleeplessness and a high level of burden. What we’re finding is that doesn’t necessarily resolve after the death of the care recipient. After the stress of providing care ends, these health conditions don’t always resolve.”
Magan’s research is partially supported by a grant from Sigma, an international honor society of nursing. She is conducting a survey study of former caregivers, focused on their levels of depression, anxiety and sleep disturbances, which is a common difficulty among former caregivers. “I’m trying to determine if there are certain personal characteristics of the caregivers that are more strongly linked with depression and poor sleep quality,” Magan said. “I’m looking at things like personality traits, coping strategies and caregiver guilt. Caregivers who have remaining guilt tend to have more depression and less sleep after the death of the recipient.”
Teaching focus: Magan is teaching Thanatology 270, “Loss Across the Lifespan” for the spring 2020 semester. The class focuses on how human beings experience and cope with loss as they move through different developmental stages of life, beginning with infants and proceeding to school age children, adolescents, young adults, and finally older adults. As she proceeds in her career at URI, Magan plans to teach more courses in the College’s Adult Gerontology Nurse Practitioner program, while continuing to focus on her research.
Why URI?: “I was looking for a university that would give me the opportunity to pursue both teaching and research, and to have a nice balance of both,” Magan said. “Some professors are more interested in one or the other, but my goal has always been to find an educational setting that would support both, and of all the universities that I looked at, I felt that this was the best fit for me. I just felt like I would be happier here because I can have that balance.”
Future plans at URI: Magan plans to continue developing and expanding her research on former caregivers of people with dementia, which will likely present opportunities for students to assist on the project. She also aims to grow as an educator. “I would say I want to increase my experience to focus on becoming the best educator I can be. I have a lot of help from my colleagues. Everyone here has been so welcoming, so kind, so helpful. I plan to continue to learn from my students and my colleagues, and just continue to grow as a teacher.”