The Hospice and Palliative Nurses Foundation is pleased to announce our first three Florence Wald Fellows: Betty Ferrell, Research Scientist at the City of Hope National Medical Center in California; Judy Lentz, Chief Executive Officer of the Alliance for Hospice and Palliative Nursing; and Jeanne Martinez, Quality and Education Specialist at Northwestern Memorial Home Health Care in Illinois. Individually and collectively these nurses have made substantive contributions to hospice and palliative nursing practice, education, and research. Their generous commitment of $10,000 as Florence Wald Fellows truly exemplifies that they continue to "lead the way."
* Dr Ferrell, who has been in her position at City of Hope since 1989, is currently involved in 10 research and special projects that involve close to $12 million in funding. This work focuses on the development of a pain resource center, end-of-life nursing education (ELNEC), decisions and outcomes of palliative surgery, disseminating end-of-life care to cancer centers, simultaneous care-linking palliative care to clinical trials, quality of life of ovarian cancer survivors, symptom clusters and quality of life in chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy, and symptoms related to advanced breast or prostate cancer. Dr Ferrell is widely published and is a Fellow in the American Academy of Nursing. For the past two years, Dr Ferrell has served as the chairperson of the National Consensus Project, which recently published the Clinical Practice Guidelines for Quality Palliative Care (of which HPNA is the Administrative Home).
* Since 2000, Ms Lentz has served as the Executive Director for the Hospice and Palliative Nurses Association, the National Board for Certification of Hospice and Palliative Nurses, and the Hospice and Palliative Nurses Foundation. These three organizations, which are housed within the Alliance for Excellence in Hospice and Palliative Nursing, have experienced unprecedented growth under Ms Lentz's leadership. She currently serves as President of the American Board of Nursing Specialties and was the immediate past Chairperson of the Hospice and Palliative Care Coalition. Prior to 2000, Ms Lentz was an oncology clinical nurse specialist for the Heritage Valley Health System.
* Ms Martinez is the President of the National Board for Certification of Hospice and Palliative Nurses (NBCHPN(R)). Under her leadership the Board developed the LP/LV and nursing assistant certification in hospice and palliative care. The NBCHPN(R) also actively collaborated with the American Nurses Credentialing Center on the development of the Advanced Practice Hospice and Palliative Care Certification Exam having recently purchased full rights to this examination program, thus making NBCHPN(R) the only nursing specialty organization to have certification examinations for all levels of nursing. For more information on certification visit http://www.nbchpn.org. From 2002 to 2004, Ms Martinez was the Associate Director for Consulting Services, The EPEC Project, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, and from 1995 to 1999, she was the Coordinator of the Center for Palliative Medicine Education and Research at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago.
Please join me in thanking these nurse philanthropists for leading the way to secure the future of hospice and palliative nursing. If you would like to learn more about the Florence Wald Fellowship program please visit http://www.hpna.org/FlorenceWald_home.asp or call the Hospice and Palliative Nurses Foundation office at 412-787-9301.
Jane Kirschling, DNS, RN
President, Hospice and Palliative Nurses Foundation Board of Directors
NBCHPN(R) News
2005 Certified Hospice and Palliative Nursing Assistant of the Year Award
The National Board for Certification of Hospice and Palliative Nurses (NBCHPN(R)) is excited to announce that A. Nicole Henely (Grafton, OH) has been named Certified Hospice and Palliative Nursing Assistant (CHPNA) of the Year and was honored in April 2005 in Atlanta, GA. The award is given annually to a CHPNA who personifies excellence in clinical practice as an end-of-life nursing assistant.
Since beginning work for Hospice of the Western Reserve in February 2000, Henely has made an impact by her dedication to serving patient needs and also mentoring new nursing assistants. Most recently she has been selected to participate in a national research project, sponsored by the Swedish Medical Center in collaboration with the Hospice and Palliative Nurses Association, to develop a multimedia CD-ROM for nursing assistants to learn more about caring for patients at the end of life.
"She consistently goes above and beyond," said Lisa Tomm, BSN, RN, CHPN(R), Team Leader at Hospice of the Western Reserve. "Patients' families truly love her. She is mentioned by name in many thank you notes received by the team."