Lourett Smith

Doctor Lourett Smith is an experienced educator and researcher with a focus on mental health nursing education and training. She holds a senior lecturing position at the Department of Nursing Science (DNS), in the Faculty of Health Sciences at the Nelson Mandela University. Currently she is developing the new Post Graduate Diploma: Mental Health Nursing Programme Curriculum at the DNS. She lectures both undergraduate and post graduate students. She has also lectured emergency medical care students and post graduate nursing education students.

Lourett’s doctoral study had a focus on family caregivers of relatives with dementia. She has a particular interest in qualitative research and phenomenology. She is presently supervising and co-supervising four master’s and four doctoral students. Lourett is also a co-researcher on a research funded project by the DSI-NRF Centre of Excellence in Human Development (CoE-Human) concerning the preparation of community health workers to support family caregivers of relatives with dementia. She has also published articles in local and international peer reviewed journals and is a reviewer for several academic journals.