NEW YORK NURSE: July/August 2008
Jean Brown has been named dean of the University at Buffalo School of Nursing. She is also a professor in Nursing, Nutrition, and Rehabilitation Sciences and adjunct professor of Oncology at Roswell Park. Brown is a principal investigator of a $1.3 million grant from the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) designed to fund the UB nursing school’s accelerated bachelor’s degree program. A fellow of the American Academy of Nursing, she was recipient of the Dean’s Excellence in Teaching Award in 2001, the sustained Achievement Award from UB in 2003, and in 2004 received the SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. In 2005, Brown was co-recipient of the Oncology Nursing Society’s Publishing Division Oncology Nursing Forum Quality of Life Award for her paper, “Quality of life and meaning of illness of women with lung cancer.” In 2007 she received the Oncology Nursing Society Foundation Connie Henke Yarbro Excellence in Cancer Nursing Mentorship Award, and was named a Distinguished Faculty Mentor. She has authored or co-authored more than 40 journal articles, has contributed several chapters to books on cancer nursing, and lectures widely.
Bridget Maybury, a performance improvement coordinator at the James J. Peters VA Medical Center, has been appointed to Bronx Community Board 8, a local representative government unit of the city of New York. The Board represents the interests and concerns of the local community on many issues including land use, education, housing, parks, public safety, elderly and youth, environment, traffic, and economic development. Maybury was motivated to serve after a meeting in 2006 that left her dissatisfied as a community member. Confident she could bring a fresh, new voice to the board and make a positive difference in the community, she underwent two interviews with the Borough President’s staff and was recently selected to serve. “I feel my experience as an RN in a hospital setting combined with state, national, and international committee experience, prepared me to be a valuable member of the Community Board. I may be one of the youngest members of the board, and I’m the only RN.” On the lighter side of her new-found duties, Maybury recently attended a barbecue hosted by Mayor Mike Bloomberg at Gracie Mansion.
NYSNA members Karen Ballard, Verlia Brown, Nancy Hagans, and Bridget Maybury recently enjoyed a spirited conversation with CNN’s Rick Sanchez on the topic of healthcare, the role of government, and the presidential candidate’s positions on healthcare reform. Sanchez opened with the fact that almost 50 million Americans are without health care coverage, that CEOs are averaging salaries of $20 million, and by 2017, one in every five taxpayer dollars will be spent on health care. In response to Sanchez’ opening question—“Why is the system broken?”—the nurses, an equal mix of Democrats and Republicans, echoed each other in responding that healthcare dollars are being funneled to tertiary care, end-of-life or catastrophic illness care, insurance and pharmaceutical companies, and paper-pushers who are not even involved in the delivery of health care.
Ballard, NYSNA’s president-elect, dismissed comparisons between universal healthcare and socialized medicine as comments “thrown out there to make people afraid.” She added that a basic system with a focus on preventative care would be preferable to spending all healthcare dollars on end-of-life care and catastrophic illness. Brown, a past NYSNA president concluded, “Whoever wins this election better be wise enough to have a lot of nurses on their healthcare team, because nurses run the hospitals and know what’s best for patients.” This was met with a high-five from Sanchez and “Amens!” from her colleagues. The interviews can be viewed on-line at www.cnn.com/video.
NYSNA members Barbara Vogel and Mary Eileen (Mel) Callan were elected to American Nurses Association leadership positions at the ANA House of Delegates meeting in Silver Spring, Md. Callan, of Webster, N.Y., was elected to the Congress of Nursing Practice and Economics. She is a past president of NYSNA and a family nurse practitioner with Highland Family Medicine. She will serve alongside four other Congress members. Vogel was elected to serve as one of four members of the Nominating Committee. She is a nursing supervisor at Monroe Community Hospital and a native of Rochester, N.Y.