Dr. Emilia Iwu is the Senior Technical Advisor, Community Medicine at IHVN/ACHIEVE project. She provides oversight for community-based programs and technical support for nursing education, mentoring and role integration for comprehensive care for people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV).
Her major research interests include HIV clinical care and workforce research especially in response to changes in health care delivery e.g. acceptability and impact of HIV task-sharing on nurses and community health workers in Nigeria.
Dr. Iwu completed her basic nursing and midwifery education at the University of Nigeria, Teaching Hospital (UNTH), Enugu and Iyienu Hospital, Ogidi. She obtained a BA in School Health Services from Rowan University of New Jersey; BS, MSc and PhD in Nursing from Rutgers the State University of New Jersey, USA.
She is on faculty at Rutgers School of Nursing, Newark and remains in clinical practice as a Family Nurse Practitioner in Southern New Jersey. Before joining Rutgers, Dr. Iwu worked at the School of Nursing, University of Maryland, where she helped design and implement a global health certificate program and mentored UMD students in Nigeria. She works with Nigerian health workers and policy makers on HIV program implementation, nursing leadership and health system strengthening. She directed the development of a national HIV/AIDS curriculum which is currently implemented at pre- licensure nursing, midwifery and community health practitioner schools in Nigeria.
Dr. Iwu is a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Jonas Foundation Nurse Leader/Faculty Fellow who actively participates and holds leadership positions in local and international nursing organizations like Sigma Theta Tau, National Association of Nigerian Nurses in North America and Association of Nurses in AIDS Care (ANAC). As past co-Chair of ANAC’s Global Committee, she helped with formation of ANAC in Nigeria. She’s a member of IOM (National Academies of Science) Forum on Health Professional Education and reviewer for HRSA, JANAC and Nigerian Journal of HIV and Human Reproduction.
