Biography

Robin Newhouse, PhD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, served as dean of the Indiana University School of Nursing from July 1, 2015 until August 9, 2024. She is an IU distinguished professor, and her research focuses on health system interventions to improve care processes and patient outcomes. Dr. Newhouse has published extensively on health services improvement interventions, acute care quality issues, and evidence-based practice.

Dr. Newhouse was appointed to the Methodology Committee of the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) in 2011, serving six years as chair of the committee, and is now serving as the committee’s vice chair. After election to the Academy Health Board in 2013, she held multiple leadership positions including chair of the Board until 2020 when she completed her service. She has served on multiple Institute of Medicine (IOM) and National Academy of Medicine (NAM) committees. Dr. Newhouse was elected as a member of (NAM) in 2017.

Dr. Newhouse serves as the lead investigator for Indiana University’s Grand Challenge: Responding to the Addictions Crisis, a $50M initiative in partnership with Indiana and its major healthcare systems to reduce substance use disorders, the number of opioid overdose deaths, and babies born with neonatal abstinence syndrome.

Dr. Newhouse is PI of two current studies. One tests the effectiveness and implementation of a Screening Brief Intervention Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) toolkit to identify people that use substances and get them needed help from critical access hospitals to academic health centers. The second study will disseminate the SBIRT toolkit across 17 hospitals in a phased approach. In 2020 her team completed an assessment of the Indiana workforce available to address the addictions crisis and tested a resource for clinicians to refer people that use substances to outpatient treatment.