Sharon Y. Irving, PhD is an Associate Professor on the Clinician Educator Track and serves as Vice-Chair in the Department of Family and Community Health at Penn Nursing. She is nationally and internationally recognized for her work in nutrition assessment, delivery, and monitoring in critically ill infants and children. Dr. Irving maintains clinical practice as a pediatric Nurse Practitioner (NP) at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, caring for critically ill infants and children. She credits clinical experience as the driving force for her program of research that is focused on nutrition assessment, determination of energy and protein requirements, monitoring nutrient delivery, and determining feeding tolerance in this population.
Dr. Irving works collaboratively across disciplines to heighten recognition of the importance of nutrition therapy on patient outcomes. She has co-authored several articles that bring new knowledge, synthesizes existing knowledge, and presents guidelines and best practices in the field of nutrition therapy in critically ill children. Dr. Irving has served as principal investigator, co-investigator, and site principal investigator on studies related to nutrition therapy in the pediatric ICU population. As an NP, she diligently works to support practice to the full scope of the NPs education to ensure optimal patient care. Her research and dedication to excellence in patient care has earned Dr. Irving fellowship status in the Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM), American Academy of Nursing (AAN) and the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (ASPEN).
