MAY 20, 2005 | Ann Coleman, Ph.D., R.N., upon receiving the inaugural Elizabeth Stanley Cooper Chair in Oncology Nursing at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS), likened herself to a turtle on a fencepost.

“You know he didn’t get there by himself,” she laughed. Coleman, a registered nurse practitioner and an advanced oncology certified nurse, humbly accepted the position, all the while recognizing a multitude of people who have helped her advance research in oncology nursing.

Coleman also is a professor in the Department of Nursing Science in the UAMS College of Nursing and professor in the Department of Internal Medicine in the UAMS College of Medicine. She has been with the UAMS College of Nursing since 1980 and served on the task force that developed the doctorate in nursing program at UAMS.

The Elizabeth Stanley Cooper Chair is the second chair in the College of Nursing at UAMS and the first for research on the UAMS campus. The John Boyd Family Endowed Chair in Pediatric Nursing is held by Bonnie Gance-Cleveland, Ph.D., associate professor in the UAMS College of Nursing, who practices at Arkansas Children’s Hospital. Coleman said the development of the oncology nursing chair will help fund research toward quality cancer care and provide training for excellent oncology nurses.

Coleman took the opportunity at the investiture to point out that cancer has once again become the top killer in the United States for people under the age of 85. She said the 1,500 cancer deaths each day in the nation now surpass the number of deaths from cardiovascular disease. She added that with the nursing shortage getting worse, the number of oncology nurses available to cancer patients is getting smaller and smaller.

UAMS College of Nursing Dean Linda Hodges said that knowing both Coleman and Cooper, she sees similarities in their passion for nursing.

“Elizabeth Stanley Cooper would have been pleased with the choice for her chair,” Hodges said.

Coleman is known for helping to determine the method of breast self examination that most doctors recommend to women today. She has received numerous awards from prestigious organizations, including the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. She was instrumental in redesigning the data collection protocol concerning breast cancer for the national cancer registry. She developed the International Breast Cancer Screening Network in 21 countries and which laid the groundwork for the Breast Cancer Surveillance Consortium in the United States.

Her study of the 1990 Medicare legislation on mammography showed that African-American women had not benefited from public outreach techniques being used at the time. Coleman used an evidence-based approach to develop and test literature on breast cancer screening for African-American women.  The resulting pamphlet, “It’s like Finding a Raisin in a Three-Layer Cake,” is used throughout the United States. 

Her current research involves supportive care studies of patients receiving high dose chemotherapy for multiple myeloma. She also is looking into the molecular epidemiology of multiple myeloma to determine the familial risk and identify genetic aberrations that will guide future therapy.

Coleman is a retired colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve, and during her 20 years of service she served as head nurse of intensive care, chief nurse of a field hospital and director of a nursing education program. She was awarded the Army medical department “A” proficiency designation, which is the highest award for exceptional professional ability. Coleman has served as a consultant to the Federal Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control, the American Cancer Society and the Oncology Nursing Society. She currently serves on the Governor’s Advisory Board for the Arkansas Breast Cancer Control Program and on the Arkansas Cancer Registry Board. 

Coleman graduated from the University of Mississippi with a Bachelor of Science in nursing in 1963 and received the Outstanding Alumnus Award of that decade in 1998. Since then, the “Elizabeth Ann Coleman Nurse Clinician Award” is given in her honor annually to an outstanding graduating student.

She received a Master of Science in nursing in 1979 and a doctorate in 1989 from the University of Texas at Austin. She completed a three-year post doctoral fellowship in Cancer Prevention and Control at the National Cancer Institute/National Institutes of Health and post-graduate work in cancer genetics at the Children’s Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati, and the Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine.

Elizabeth Stanley Cooper received a bachelor of nursing degree from Yale University School of Nursing. In 1944 she moved to Little Rock with her husband, William Grant Cooper Jr., M.D., where he practiced as a general surgeon. She served as a charter member of the first Community Advisory Council for the UAMS College of Nursing from May 15, 1991, until her death on June 21, 1994.

 At her death, friends and colleagues established the Elizabeth Stanley Cooper Oncology Nursing Endowment Fund in the College of Nursing. The fund received generous support from the George Frederick Jewett Foundation.

 An endowed chair is the highest academic honor that can be bestowed by a university on its faculty. A chair can honor the memory of a loved one or a person’s accomplishments. It is supported with designated gifts of $1 million or more.
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