Maria C. Dolce Earns Third Nursing Degree from NYU

      This spring, Maria C. Dolce added Ph.D. to her nursing credentials, fulfilling a life-long ambition. But the NYU Commencement ceremony may feel like déjà vu to Dolce, who also earned her B.S. in 1979 and M.A. in 1985 from the University. It was after her daughter completed graduate school that she applied for and received the Mary Clark Rockefeller Fellowship in 2006, allowing her to return to NYU for full-time doctoral study. Along the way, she was named a Rudin Family Doctoral Student and was awarded a research grant by the Sigma Theta Tau International Upsilon Chapter.
      As a young nurse, Dolce worked in critical care at NYU Medical Center and is currently a system nurse educator at the Institute for Nursing at North-Shore Long Island Jewish Health System. Her doctoral research involved studying 488 cancer survivors who participate in online cancer support groups and how that has impacted their relationships with their health care providers, predominantly oncologists. Two major themes emerged.
      “Some patients experienced disenchantment with their health care provider because their information-seeking on the Internet had created certain expectations of the treatment they could receive,” says Dolce. “In other cases, it was pre-existing disenchantment with their doctors that led them to seek more information from the Internet.”
      Dolce hopes to continue to pursue her interest in how Internet technology can change a patient’s experience and perceptions. She is particularly interested in the likely increase in older adults going online for self-management and self-care. This stems, in part, from her work as an adjunct simulation instructor in the undergraduate elder care course at the College of Nursing. She was also inspired by the overall diversity of the faculty and fellow students in her classes.
      “I’ve been blessed to have had a global experience in the classroom—with colleagues from Malawi to Taiwan to Serbia,” she says. “It transforms how you look at your world”