Brockie receives prestigious award from Johns Hopkins

Teresa Brockie, Ph.D, Master of Science Nursing, RN, a member of the Aaniiih Tribe who grew up in Hays, was given the 2021 Career Impact Award at Johns Hopkins University last week for exceptional work supporting the campus' students and community.

The award is among the most prestigious in the field and celebrates faculty members, students, postdoctoral fellows and alumni who have gone above and beyond in support of others across the Johns Hopkins community.

Brockie said she was proud to have received the honor but said her mentorship of students was not done for a reward, but to fulfill a responsibility and do for others what was done for her.

"My career path was not a solo journey," she said. "There have been plenty of people along the way who opened doors and who shown a bright light for my path ... I know that it's my responsibility to reach back my hand and help those coming after me."

Brockie graduated from Hays-Lodge Pole High School before receiving her undergraduate degree in nursing from the University of North Dakota, and her graduate degree and Ph.D. in nursing from Johns Hopkins University, where she eventually became a professor, five years ago.

Before that, she worked for the National Institutes of Health for nine years but neither workplace was one she envisioned for herself during her days in Montana.

"I couldn't ever imagine, as someone growing up in Hays, Montana, that I would even be working at the NIH Clinical Center or at Johns Hopkins University," she said.

One of the people she has helped is Ph.D. candidate and Baltimore hospice nurse Katie Nelson, whom Brockie has mentored during her time working on her doctorate, and the one who nominated Brockie for the award.

Nelson, originally from Minnesota, said she met her mentor about a year into her studies at Johns Hopkins and Brockie always treated her as not just a health care professional or Ph.D. student but as a person, which is important in the high-stress environment the pandemic has created.

"She acknowledges people on a human level, which I think is really important, especially with how difficult it is right now," she said. " ... People are more than the work that they do."

She said Brockie always bends over backward to help people at the university despite how difficult the field is right now, and that kind of mentorship is so much better than one that is strictly professional.

Brockie said it was great to hear such praise from Nelson and others during her acceptance of the award last Thursday.

Brockie and Nelson's work amid the pandemic

Much of Brockie's recent work has centered around suicide prevention in Native American communities, and they've recently started making connections with Fort Belknap.

"Most of my work has been with the Fort Peck Tribes in Montana, developing interventions and we are now branching out to Fort Belknap," she said.

Brockie said they have two grants they are working on with Fort Belknap and Aaniiih Nakoda College, but much of that work had to be put on hold for the last two years as the area endures waves of COVID-19.

When it came to Fort Peck, she said, it didn't make sense to ask their local teams and tribal partners to work on interventions when there were more immediate concerns and so they all shifted their focus to COVID-19.

She said her team assisted the tribe with raising funds, providing masks, contact tracing and isolation support, as well as data reporting while hiring more people to aid in the fight against the pandemic.

Brockie said the local team did a tremendous amount of work during an extremely emotional time, and the pandemic along with the circumstances surrounding it had a clear mental health impact on them.

She said the stresses already on Native American communities have only been exacerbated by the pandemic.

"Sometimes it already feels like we're constantly living in fear on the reservation, so it's just an addition to that," she said.

Brockie said they implemented a weekly talking circle for the local team which included one of the community's spiritual leaders to help them deal with the stress of the pandemic.

She said it's still unknown how great the full mental health impact of the pandemic will be, but it's going to be around for a very long time, and she's not immune to it.

She said not having access to ceremony, family and home has been very difficult for her personally.

"I like to think that I'm strong spiritually, but it's had an impact on me as well," Brockie said.

Nelson's recent research has also been focused on the Fort Belknap area, attempting to improve end-of-life care and support caregivers for those with serious illness.

However, she is also a practicing nurse, and has seen firsthand how devastating the effects of COVID-19 have been and, between the news and firsthand experience, she said, it's hard to let it go when she goes home.

"It's not something you can turn off at the end of the day," she said. "It sticks with you wherever you go."

She said the virus is complex and no two cases are exactly the same, so even when directly treating people suffering from the virus it never quite feels like they have a handle on it, and that affects people in health care.

However, Nelson said, regardless of whether someone is in health care or not, the pandemic has created a sense of loss for practically everyone.

"I think everybody, no matter what sector they work in, has experienced some level of grief related to the pandemic," she said, "Whether it's the loss of a loved one, the loss of a friend, or even just the loss of normalcy, the way life was before."

She said it may seem obvious but the pandemic has made clear how important self care is.

What's next

Brockie said that, while her work has had to be delayed due to the pandemic, plans are still being made for how to use the funds they have access to.

This summer, she said, she and her team will be working to create a pathway to nursing, public health and STEM for Aaniiih Nakoda high school students.

Starting in March and running through September, she said, they will also begin data collection on suicide, looking for risk factors for suicide in the area and contributing factors for suicide clusters to develop interventions and provide help for those who have lost loved ones to suicide.

Nelson said she's hoping to get started soon surveying, conducting interviews and data gathering to create research that will be used by local providers to give culturally appropriate end-of-life care to people, and allow family caregivers to help those they care for stay where they want even when suffering from serious illness.

"Both of us are looking forward to getting back out to Fort Belknap," she said.