She is a 1974 graduate of the University of Missouri, Kansas City/Research College of Nursing and is Board Certified in Psychiatric- Mental Health Nursing. Her teaching responsibilities include Social Determinants of Health, Health Literacy, and Public Health. She is clinical lead in the two Family Medicine training clinics for a number of local and national initiatives, including Screen and Intervene in Childhood Hunger, a 2 year demonstration project on screening for food insecurity at Well Child Checks. She is a member of the Childhood Hunger Coalition, a network of health care professionals, public health and anti-hunger advocates working together to educate the medical community, policy makers and the general public about the impacts of childhood food insecurity and hunger.