COPE Program Creator and Founder of COPE2Thrive

View Dr. Melnyk's Biosketch

Meet Bernadette Mazurek Melnyk, PhD, APRN-CNP, FAANP, FNAP, FAAN

For Bernadette Melnyk, the COPE Program is the realization of a lifelong dream to bring young people the type of help that was unavailable to her during her own difficult teenage years. When Bern was 15 years of age, her mother died suddenly from a stroke right in front of her. The Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), anxiety and depression that followed lasted a few years and went untreated. At that time, and in rural Pennsylvania where Bern grew up, mental health disorders were not routinely recognized or talked about much. Mental health stigma in her small rural coal-mining town was prevalent. Sadly, it still exists across the U.S. today.

Bern is a nationally/internationally recognized author, speaker, practitioner, researcher and expert in child, adolescent and young adult mental health, evidence-based practice, intervention research and health and well-being. She has over 580 publications, including a book entitled A Practical Guide to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Screening, Early Intervention, and Health Promotion (3rd edition) (2022). New York, NY: Springer Publishing and NAPNAP.

For Bern, caring for others was the start of her recovery. She graduated from nursing school at West Virginia University, and started practicing in the pediatric intensive care unit at Children's Hospital in Pittsburgh. She holds a Master's Degree with a Pediatric Nurse Practitioner (PNP) specialty from the University of Pittsburgh, and completed her PhD and post-master's certificate as a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner at the University of Rochester. Bern had a mental health practice in Rochester, New York, and was a consultant for a child and adolescent in-patient psychiatric center in Upstate New York for several years.  She has extensive experience in integrating mental and physical healthcare as well as conducting workshops with health professionals on how to better screen for, identify, and provide evidence-based management for a variety of child and adolescent mental health disorders. Bern is a frequent invited keynote speaker at national and international conferences.

Bern's ultimate goal is to get COPE into the hands of every child, teen, and young adult who suffers from stress, depression, anxiety or other mental health disorders that keep them from living a happy, healthy, full life as well as to deliver the program to all children and youth in order to prevent mental health problems and enhance healthy lifestyle behaviors.

Bern has been recognized as an Edge Runner by the American Academy of Nursing for her evidence-based programs that decrease depression/anxiety and improve healthy lifestyle behaviors in children, teens and young adults/college students. Her COPE TEEN program is also a designated research tested intervention (RTIP) program by NIH (see https://ebccp.cancercontrol.cancer.gov/programDetails.do?programId=22686590).

Click here to view a Personal Program Overview from Dr. Melnyk