Wysocki chosen as dean of School of Nursing

Annette B. Wysocki, dean and professor in the School of Nursing at Stony Brook University, has been appointed dean of the UB School of Nursing.

The announcement was made Thursday by A. Scott Weber, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs, and Allison Brashear, vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at UB, following a highly competitive national search.

Wysocki brings to this role “extensive leadership experience, exceptional research accomplishments and teaching record, a deep understanding of the challenges and opportunities in the field of nursing, and strong vision for enhancing the impact and reputation of the school,” according to an email Weber and Brashear shared with the campus community.

Wysocki will join UB in July. She succeeds Marsha Lewis.

“I am so delighted to join the team at the University at Buffalo as dean of the School of Nursing,” Wysocki said. “UB has a laser-like focus on achieving national rankings across the academic units to move the entire organization forward to achieve even greater global prominence by engaging in cutting-edge research.

“Faculty scientists at the School of Nursing are actively engaged in NIH-funded research studies on insomnia, alcohol use and Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias that addresses some of the most pressing health care needs of the nation,” she said. “I look forward to advancing and supporting the research, education and practice missions of the School of Nursing to improve human health.”

In 2019, Wysocki joined Stony Brook University from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she served as associate dean for research and professor in the College of Nursing. At UMass Amherst, Wysocki was instrumental in establishing the UManage Center, an interdisciplinary research center focused on developing technologies to manage symptoms of chronic illness.

While at UMass, Wysocki also worked with leaders across campus to secure $95 million to establish the Institute for Applied Life Sciences that includes the Center for Personalized Health Monitoring, the Models to Medicine Center and the Center for Bioactive Delivery. She also was on the statewide Life Science Task Force to develop a five-year plan for the UMass system that obtained $300 million in economic development funds.

Wysocki previously was the first permanent scientific director of the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) and chief of the Wound Healing Laboratory at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). At NINR, she started the Summer Genetics Institute, one of the most successful programs ever established at NINR.

She also served on the board of governors of the NIH Clinical Center, broke ground and was on the design team for the Mark O. Hatfield Clinical Research Center, and helped to initiate the NCI-All Ireland Cancer Consortium.

Wysocki’s research focuses on the pathophysiology of delayed healing in chronic wounds. She discovered that fibronectin, the major extracellular matrix adhesive glycoprotein in the body required to heal wounds, is degraded. Her research also showed matrix degradation results from both the activation and overexpression of matrix metalloproteinases (MMP2 and MMP9) and an imbalance of urokinase plasminogen activator-plasminogen activator inhibitor (uPA-PAI), and that colonizing bacteria in open skin wounds can express proteinases capable of degrading extracellular matrix proteins required for healing. 

Together, these findings led to the development of dressing products to promote healing, as well as diagnostic tests to detect whether wounds are properly healing. She has authored more than 50 scholarly publications and presented her research findings nationally and internationally. She has been funded by the NIH, National Science Foundation, Office of Naval Research and the American Nurses Foundation.

A fellow of the American Academy of Nursing, she serves on its Bioethics Expert Panel and the Aging Expert Panel. Wysocki is also an active member of the Research Leader Network for the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN). She has served in many advisory and leadership roles, including as president of the Wound Healing Foundation, and on the board of directors of the Wound Healing Society. She has received numerous awards recognizing the impact of her contributions, including the Distinguished Service Award from the Wound Healing Society.

As a member of the American Society for Cell Biology, Wysocki served on the Congressional Liaison Committee. She is a Harvard Macy Scholar and a fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine.

Wysocki holds a PhD from the University of Texas at Austin, and bachelor’s and master’s degrees from East Carolina University, all in nursing. She was a postdoctoral research fellow in cell biology at University of Texas Southwestern and Weill Cornell Medical College.

In their email the university, Weber and Brashear thanked outgoing dean Lewis for her excellent leadership over the past decade. Lewis is stepping down on May 31. Brashear will serve as officer in charge of the School of Nursing from June 1 until Wysocki arrives in July.