She is known for her never-ending energy and contagious joy. Liliana Mota is also a researcher who is passionate about what she does, a creator of “apostles”, an advocate of teamwork and the connection to clinical practice, and a scientist who is highly aware of the impact her work can have on society.
These are some of the reasons why she was recently awarded the Research Award of the Order of Nurses (Central Region). The prize was recently awarded to the researcher who is part of the Tech4edusim research group at CINTESIS and the Associate Laboratory RISE, as well as an Adjunct Professor at the Northern School of Health of the Portuguese Red Cross.
Her reaction to the recognition given by her peers was very emotional, although a little late, as she was hospitalized on the day of the award ceremony due to a sudden health problem, from which she has now fully recovered. In an interview, she told us how honored and proud she was to receive this award, but also of her enthusiasm for the research projects she is working on and how much she intends to do and achieve.
Liliana Mota was born and raised in Vila Nova de Gaia and completed her schooling in this municipality. As an extremely hard-working student, with an academic score of 19, she doesn’t hide the fact that Medicine was her course of choice, having missed out by a tenth (she got 18.4, when the last student to get in was 18.5). She chose to study Nursing at the Nursing school of Porto (ESEP), then called Nursing School São João. She completed her degree in 2004 and immediately began working as a nurse at the Hospital Center of Porto (CHP), then called Hospital of Santo António, in the area of liver, kidney and pancreatic transplantation, later joining the Transplantation Council of the Liver and Pancreatic Transplant Unit.
Two years later, she joined the Master’s Degree in Medical Informatics (MIM) of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto (FMUP), coordinated by Altamiro da Costa Pereira, the current coordinator of CINTESIS and director of this Faculty. “I’m very proud to have been part of the first edition, in 2006. It was this course that opened up my horizons and allowed me to look at care, research and computerization in health differently,” she recalls.
From 2010 to 2011, she enrolled in a Postgraduate and Master’s Degree in Medical-Surgical Nursing at ESEP to have her specialization recognized by the Order of Nurses. She had not yet finished this master’s degree and was already starting her PhD in Nursing Sciences at the University of Porto, during which she developed a model for monitoring patients undergoing liver transplantation.
In 2010, she began her teaching career, first as a Guest Assistant at ESEP until 2016, when the opportunity arose to devote herself to full-time teaching. She then left the ESEP and the CHP for the Northern School of Health of the Portuguese Red Cross, in Oliveira de Azeméis, where besides working as an Adjunct Professor, she also holds the position of President of the Technical-Scientific Council, coordinator of the research unit and editor-in-chief of the Revista de Investigação & Inovação em Saúde (Journal of Research & Innovation in Health), which has already been indexed internationally for three years.
Joining CINTESIS came about after her PhD, in 2018, at the invitation of the coordinator of the Tech4EduSim group, Miguel Padilha, as a result of the researcher’s interest in the area of health simulation and her proven track record in this field, with prizes awarded by the Portuguese Society for Simulation Applied to the Health Sciences and her school’s simulation center (Stimulus Prize for Research at the Northern School of Health of the Portuguese Red Cross, in 2020).
“Obtaining funding for our projects is our biggest difficulty. We’re trying to get funding through H2030. Technological development tools supported by research need investment,” she explains.
One of the advantages of being a member of CINTESIS is precisely the “networking” that makes it possible to “leverage research” and helps obtain funding. “The number of times we apply for funding, regardless of whether we get it or not, is also key. Being part of CINTESIS helps us because we are constantly receiving information about open applications and it allows us to work in collaboration with researchers from other areas,” she stresses.
The researcher also highlights “the multidisciplinary and collaborative vision and the openness so that all disciplines of knowledge can make their contribution. CINTESIS must not lose this vision because it is what makes it different from all other research units, it is this differentiating vision that makes it powerful. That’s what seduced me.”
For her, “the richness of CINTESIS lies in getting partners from other areas of knowledge. In other units, this would be very difficult”. She continues: “This ability to understand the importance of multidisciplinarity is crucial. We can no longer look at scientific development in a unidisciplinary way. We have learned that we are complementary and that it is in this complementarity that we are able to be truly significant for the people who receive our care. It is essential that research can respond to society’s needs. That’s what science is there for.”
Liliana Mota is currently working on several projects, namely a project to validate an instrument for assessing the effectiveness of learning through simulation for the Portuguese population, another to validate an instrument for assessing the training needs of nurses in Gastroenterology for the Portuguese population and another related to “serious games” in the learning of nursing students. The researcher is also developing an educational tool for implementing evidence-based clinical practice, as well as a model aimed at preparing military personnel for health operations theaters.
In addition to simulation, she is working on projects that aim to create a technological tool for people with chronic illnesses and their families and another technological tool for survivors of critical illnesses. For technological development, at the end of 2023, she received the H-Innova Award – Health Innovation Hub, in the PhD Researchers category, along with other researchers, at the Digital Health Summit, for the tool dedicated to survivors of critical illness.
Her extensive curriculum also includes a postgraduate degree in Health Services Management (2019-2020) and a postgraduate degree in Palliative Care (2021). She has published research in different areas, from liver transplantation and transplant patients to nursing information systems, leadership skills of a specialist nurse, evidence-based practice, oncology, intensive care, palliative care and simulation in the context of teaching.
What is your 1-Year Ambition?
In a year’s time, I’d really like to get a lot of funding from H2030. That would be the ultimate goal for the projects I have underway, especially those based on technological development. I would also very much like the Portuguese Red Cross to become a “Living Lab”.
What is your 10-Year Ambition?
Ten years is a long time! I would like the Portuguese Red Cross to be a CINTESIS@RISE associate center. I believe that the “Living Lab” would be a great lever for us to become an affiliated center and to develop other types of research. I believe that this will be the way forward.
How is Life Beyond Teaching and Research?
I’m a saxophonist. I studied at the Gaia Conservatory of Music. I used to go to nursing classes with my saxophone on my back. The development of transversal skills that music allows was fundamental in making me the person I am today. So, in my spare time, I really enjoy playing the saxophone. It’s something that inspires me a lot. My only regret is that I don’t have time to return to the stage.