Around the country, print, broadcast and online media outlets are covering the groundbreaking work of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) leaders, scholars, fellows and grantees. Some recent examples:

In a piece about the growing need for advanced nursing education, Nurse.com interviewed a group of nurse leaders working to fulfill a recommendation from the Institute of Medicine report, The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health, which calls for doubling the number of doctorate-level nurses by 2020. Among those quoted: Christine Kovner, RN, PhD, FAAN, co-principal of RWJF’s RN Work Project; RWJF Executive Nurse Fellows alumna Jane Kirschling, RN, DNS, FAAN; and Susan Bakewell-Sachs, RN, PhD, PNP-BC, program director for the New Jersey Nursing Initiative, a program of RWJF and the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce Foundation.

Nurse.com and Infection Control Today report on an RWJF-supported study that finds hospitals that have higher percentages of nurses with baccalaureate degrees have lower rates of postsurgical mortality. The study, published in the March issue of Health Affairs, stems from the Future of Nursing: Campaign for Action.  Read more about the study.

“I recently traveled to Singapore, where I met with other doctors and told about being the emergency department (ED) doctor at the University of Colorado Hospital the morning of the Aurora theater shootings on July 20, 2012,” RWJF Clinical Scholars alumna Comilla Sasson, MD, MS, FACEP, writes in an op-ed for the Denver Post. “One thing dawned on me as I spoke: I had seen more gunshot wound victims in that one night than these doctors will see in their entire careers.” Read a post Sasson wrote for the RWJF Human Capital Blog about the Aurora theater shootings, and learn more about her experience talking to the national news media afterward.

New research shows that physicians who exercise and don’t smoke are much more likely to recommend healthy lifestyle changes to their patients than their smoking or non-exercising colleagues.

Researchers surveyed 1,000 primary care physicians and found that the ones who exercised at least once a week or who didn’t smoke were twice as likely to recommend five key lifestyle changes to patients suffering from hypertension: eating a healthy diet, reducing their salt intake, reaching or maintaining a healthy weight, limiting their use of alcohol and exercising regularly.

According to an article in American Medical News, the findings were presented at a March 14 meeting of the American Heart Association (AHA). “Practicing what we preach is important,” Jo Marie Reilly, MD, an associate professor at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California, is quoted saying. “Physicians are just more aware and better able to counsel patients if they take care of themselves.”

“Physicians who are healthier themselves are more apt to counsel patients about healthy lifestyle and diet,” agrees Ralph Sacco, MD, immediate past president of AHA and chairman of neurology at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. “They are more educated, more personally invested in personal health and therefore, better health advocates for their patients.”

Reilly notes that physicians who are not themselves physically fit can still recommend a healthy lifestyle to their patients, using their own experiences to relate to patients’ struggles. “It’s really important that we take that time to counsel patients about how their health habits influence their lives at each visit, and that we look at that as important as any medication,” she says.

What do you think? Does your doctor discuss healthy lifestyles with you? If you’re a health care provider, do you raise the subject with your patients? Register below to leave a comment.

Read a related blog post by Rashawn Ray, PhD, a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Scholar in Health Policy Research.