SCHOLAR DIRECTORY

I am a Family Nurse Practitioner and Doctor of Nursing Practice student at Oregon Health and Sciences University in Portland, with my clinical experiences and clinical inquiry project focused on rural areas in Oregon. I am a member of the International Association of Forensic Nurses, Association of Students for the Underserved, and Rural Health Interest Group. Prior to a career in nursing I spent time as a mural painter and artist in San Francisco in addition to working as a doula with homeless women and volunteering with the San Francisco AIDS foundation. These experiences led to my passion in nursing. I attended Pace University for my Bachelors of Science in Nursing and have since worked in the field of public health and primary care with a focus on women’s health in Colorado and Oregon. In addition, I am certified as a Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner for Adults and Adolescents and have been providing forensic exams, lecturing, and precepting for the past 2.5 years. My current focus is expanding the role of tele-medicine in rural communities to provide forensic examinations for victims of assaults as well as studying and expanding advocacy care and awareness of child abuse and intimate partner violence. My passion lies in working with underserved women and children and victims of abuse.

I am a Neurology Nurse Practitioner and Certified Multiple Sclerosis Specialist working in the Duke University Hospital MS Clinic. I am passionate about helping patients define and achieve health goals and live their lives to the fullest. While in the Adult Nurse Practitioner Program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, I received the James M. Johnston Scholarship and the Sigma Theta Tau Award for academic excellence. I completed my capstone clinical residency with the Duke Neurology Stroke Team. I hold certifications from the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, the Consortium of MS Centers, and the American Board of Neuroscience Nursing, and I am a member of the American Academy of Neurology. I plan to obtain my DNP with Post-Masters Certification as a Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner to provide psychiatric care to patients with chronic neurological disorders and to help increase patient access to mental health services in North Carolina.

My favorite book as a child was the Golden book, Nurse Nancy. I read it until the binding tore away. Besides the two weeks that Angie Dickenson convinced be to be a police woman, I don’t remember ever wanting to be anything but a nurse. In High School I earned a scholarship to Nursing school. Half way through the program my mother became ill with cancer and I took a semester off to work and help with family expenses. Unknowingly, I forfeited my scholarship. Unable to afford to go back to school, I joined the Army to pay for my education. Serving as a combat medic further encouraged me to complete my education. I have been a nurse for twenty years, for the last ten years I have worked as a Wound, Ostomy, and Continence nurse (WOCN); a field which I now consider to be my passion. Last year, I completed my MSN and now I work as a WOCN CNS at San Antonio Military Medical Center. It is a pleasure and a privilege to serve both past and present warriors. Completing my CNS degree has elevated my practice to a higher level. I will begin the PhD program in Nursing research at University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio this fall. I am looking forward to completing research in the field of wound care. I am fortunate enough to have my wonderful husband of twenty six years, and two great children supporting me with this new endeavor.

I teach community health nursing at Seattle University, including clinical work within the downtown and First Hill areas of Seattle. Part of my clinical work involves working with veterans who are homeless or low-income. I focus my teaching on addressing the needs of these veterans, including listening to their stories about how they transitioned following deployment and in the years since their deployment. These transitions include health, profession, and life changes (Meleis, 2010). The veterans of the Vietnam War have experienced transitions over the course of their lives following their deployment in the 1960-70s. Their descriptions of how they have come to live with little or no income is indicative of how the lives of veterans following deployment, is a public health issue. My goal in my dissertation is to focus on the transitions these veterans have faced over time so that nursing can understand its contribution to the veteran over the course of a lifetime. In turn, this will support nursing knowledge of how to care for current veterans following deployment, so that they may experience the transitions described by Meleis, while achieving a sense of belonging in their community. My students meet weekly with this population, teaching them about health promotion, linking them to health resources and community resources, and listening to their stories. In turn, this provides nursing the knowledge about how to promote a sense of belonging for the veteran.