Nicole Wheeler, DNP, CNM

Assistant Professor (Clinical)

142 Cohn, 5557 Cass Ave., Detroit, MI 48202
bv8083@wayne.edu
734-751-5056

Office hours

By appointment

Nicole Wheeler, DNP, CNM

Bio Sketch

As a DNP prepared nurse, Dr. Wheeler is passionate about serving women and ensuring that the evidence-based research conducted by her PhD colleagues is being brought to the bedside and clinics to improve women’s health outcomes. Her research has been focused on continuous labor support, postpartum depression and health literacy.

"There is significant evidence supporting provision of continuous labor support (CLS) to women in labor and the positive outcomes to the women, infants and birth. However, there is a significant gap between best-practice evidence and what is practiced on labor and delivery units," Dr. Wheeler explains.

Additionally, Dr. Wheeler has been involved in research that suggested that church member support decreased postpartum depression rates when compared with women who did not have access to church members to support them. An article titled “Church member support benefits psychological well-being of pregnant African American women” was published in the Journal of Christian Nursing in 2016. Most recently, she has completed a literature review focused on the themes of the impact of health literacy in postpartum depression. The article identified three major themes, including lower education in women leading to decreased health literacy, decreased health literacy leading to high rates of medical mistrust and very high rates of undiagnosed and untreated paternal postpartum depression. It is Dr. Wheeler's passionate belief that there is a correlation between health literacy and poor maternal and infant outcomes due to what she has seen in her clinical practice.

"I see women every day in my practice that cannot read or write and struggle to understand what previous providers have told them, what their medication bottles say, how to make infant formula, and don’t understand schedules of when their infant needs to be seen at the pediatrician. I have a strong belief that we could do better for them."

Education

DNP, Wayne State University, 2017
BSN, Madonna University, 2012

Research Interests

Maternal-child health
Health literacy
Postpartum depression
LGBTQIA interests
Nurse-to-nurse incivility
Depression and anxiety
Transgender health care
Food insecurities

DNP project planning:

Open to all DNP projects

Project types:

Quality improvement
Program evaluations

Clinical Area(s) of Expertise

Midwifery care
Labor and delivery nursing
Pediatrics
Emergency room nursing

Selected publications

Audritsh, N.L., Measuring the impact of health literacy on perinatal depression. Advances in Family Practice Nursing, 4
Murn, N.L. (2019). Mothering the mother: An educational program for nurse-provided continuous labor support. Journal of Perinatal Education, 28(4), 199-209.
Giurgescu, C. & Murn, N. (2016). Church member support benefits psychological well-being of pregnant African American women. Journal of Christian Nursing, 33(2), 87-91.

Honors and Awards

Member, Sigma Theta Tau International, Lambda Chapter

Current Research

Health literacy
Postpartum depression
Transgender care in the labor and birth setting

Courses taught by Nicole Wheeler, DNP, CNM

Winter Term 2025 (future)

Fall Term 2024

Spring-Summer Term 2024

NUR8625 - Evidence Based Nursing Practice: Theoretical and Methodological Issues

Winter Term 2024

Fall Term 2023

Spring-Summer Term 2023

Winter Term 2023

Fall Term 2022

Spring-Summer Term 2022

Winter Term 2022

Recent university news spotlights

Wayne State’s social mobility mission and College to Career focus reflected in nursing student’s hard-fought success following brain injury

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