Biography

Dr. Lorraine M. Wright is an author, international lecturer, consultant, and marriage and family therapist. She is also Professor Emeritus of Nursing, at the University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Lorraine established the Family Nursing Unit within the Faculty of Nursing and was the Director for 20 years. The Family Nursing Unit is a unique outpatient clinic for the treatment and study of families suffering with serious mental or physical illness.

Lorraine focuses her lectures, clinical practice and research on 1) illness beliefs of families and health care professionals; 2) spirituality, suffering and illness; and 3) family interventions.
She has co-developed the Illness Beliefs Model, and Calgary Family Assessment and Intervention Model. More recently, she has developed the Trinity Model.

Lorraine is a much sought after national and international speaker. She has given over 300 presentations at national and international family health, family nursing, family therapy, and spirituality and health conferences in Australia, Canada, British Isles, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Hong Kong, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Portugal, Thailand, Singapore, Sweden, and the United States.

Lorraine has recently completed her seventh book Suffering, Spirituality, and Illness: Ideas for Healing, was published in 2005. She is also co-author of 2 books: Nurses and families: A guide to family assessment and intervention (4th ed.) (2005), and Beliefs: The heart of healing in families and illness (1996). She is also the co-editor of 4 books: The cutting edge of family nursing (1990); Families and chronic illness (1987); Families and life-threatening illness (1987) and Families and psychosocial problems (1987).

Presently, she serves on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Family Nursing; and Advisory Editor of the journals Families, Systems and Health; and Contemporary Family Therapy: An International Journal.

Lorraine is also a member of the Canadian Nurses Association, American Academy of Family Therapy, and Approved Supervisor, Fellow, and Clinical Member of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy.