Cornelia Beck, Ph.D., R.N., FAAN, is Professor, Department of Geriatrics, and Adjunct Professor, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, in the College of Medicine and Adjunct Professor in the College of Nursing at UAMS. She also serves as the Director of the UAMS Pat and Williard Walker Memory Research Center, funded by the National Institute on Aging.
Dr. Beck has conducted research with elderly patients who have dementia since 1984. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) and various foundations have provided funding for her research on functional improvement, nonpharmacologic interventions to address behavioral symptoms, and strategies to improve best practices in long-term care settings.
She has written extensively in the area of mental health care of the older adult and serves on the editorial review boards of eight professional journals. Dr. Beck has served on the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) Advisory Council, the Advisory Committee to the Director of NINR, and Chair of the NINR Nursing Research Study Section. For Alzheimer’s Disease International, Dr. Beck is on the Medical and Scientific Panel, and for the National Alzheimer’s Association, she serves on the Medical Scientific Advisory Council.
Beck, C. Heacock, P., Mercer, S., Doan, R., O’Sullivan, P., Stevenson, J., Schnelle, J., & Hoskins, J.G., (2005). Sustaining a best-care practice in a nursing home. Journal for Healthcare Quality,27(4), 5-16.
Richards, K.C., Beck, C., O’Sullivan, P.S., & Shue, V.M. (2005). Effect of individualized social activity on sleep in nursing home residents with dementia. Journal of the American Geriatric Society, 53(9), 1510-1517.
Tak, S. & Beck, C. (2005). Computer-assisted stimulating activities for persons with dementia: Abstract. Gerontechnology, 3(4), 188.
Snow, A.L., O’Malley, K., J. Kunik, M.E., Cody, M., Beck, C., Ashton, C., Bruera E., & Novy, D., (2004). A conceptual model of pain assessment for non-communicative persons with dementia. The Gerontologist, 44(6), 807-817.
Snow, A.L., Weber, J.B., O’Malley, K.J., Cody, M. Beck, C., Bruera E., Ashton, C., & Kunik, M.E. (2004). NOPPAIN: A nursing assistant-administered pain assessment instrument for use in dementia. Dementia and Geriatric Cognitive Disorders, 17, 240-246.
Chumbler, N.R., Fortney, J., Cody, M., & Beck, C., (2004). Sense of coherence and mental health service utilization: The case of family caregivers of community-dwelling cognitively-impaired seniors. Research in the Sociology of Health Care, 22, 159-173.
Richards, K.C., & Beck, C.K., (2004). Progressively lowered stress threshold model: Understanding behavioral symptoms of dementia. (Editorial). Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 52(10), 1774-1775.
Souder, E. & Beck, C. (2004).Overview of Alzheimer’s disease. Nursing Clinics of North America, 39(3), 545-559.
Souder, E., Rapp, C.G., Davis, G.V., Beck, C., Leim, P.H. (2004). Care of individuals with Alzheimer’s disease in the new millennium. Medsurg Nursing, The Journal of Adult Health, 13,(1), 22-31
