Assistant Professor of Undergraduate Nursing

• Aug 2021 - Present

Registered Nurse

• Mar 2019 - Jun 2023

Occupational health nurse with a focus on total worker health services, such as:
Pre-employment assessments
Work injury prevention
Workman's Compensation injury care and management
DOT certifications
Immunizations
Blood borne pathogen follow up
Potential/new employee screenings for communicable diseases, education, and occupational resources for companies
Certified by the Council for Accreditation in Occupational Hearing Conservation. Show less

Director of Surgical Specialty Clinics

• Mar 2017 - Mar 2019

Responsible for the leadership and management of the surgical/specialty clinics, including but not limited to: Eye Care, Orthopedics/Sports Medicine, Podiatry, General Surgery, Dermatology, Wound Care, and Hand/Plastic/Reconstructive Surgery.Organizes, supports, delegates and facilitates activities within the assigned clinics and maintains an active presence and availability to staff and providers.Works closely with the Service Line VP, Surgical/Specialty Care Leadership team, management team, staff and providers to effectively coordinate and deliver patient care services and to enhance physician, associate provider, and staff engagement, patient/client satisfaction and continuous systems improvement initiatives. Show less

Executive Director

• Aug 2015 - Feb 2017

Background: Responsible for creating an infrastructure and systems that support positive clinic and financial outcomes and strong patient satisfaction. Direct responsibility for 7 clinic locations serving 8 counties in western Wisconsin with a total of 12,000 patient visits annually.Accomplishments:*Advanced the agency by spearheading and implementing a sustainability initiative that would align the agency’s staffing and expenses with current patient volumes and forecasted revenue streams. *Improved staff engagement and built an environment of transparency and trust via regular communication and mentoring.*Improved the agency’s strategy to include metrics, data, and analysis.*Responsible for regularly communicating organizational updates to multiple stakeholders: Essential Health Clinic governing board, Gundersen Health System leadership, donors, funding sources (local and federal), and medical director.*Oversaw the redesign of the community engagement department based on impact analysis of outreach efforts versus traditional marketing strategies.*Integrated the use of digital marketing and social media into the strategic outreach for increased awareness of client services.*Created and implemented orientation process for new staff and board seats.*Conceptualized the benefit of a quality assurance nurse position with immediate benefits to clinical quality and compliance.*Renewed board relations including the filling of board seats, creation of board binders outlining responsibilities and resources and drafted committee charters to reflect board bylaws.*Considerably increased knowledge of legal issues, requirements and ramifications in an every-changing healthcare environment.*Oversaw clinical staff’s testing of system updates prior to the 10/1/2015 launch of ICD-10. Mitigated issues by working collaboratively with practice management system representative. Show less

Interim Executive Director

• May 2015 - Aug 2015

Background: Asked to serve as interim Executive Director. Served as ambassador to staff, Board, and community partners. During this time Options Clinic rebranded to become Essential Health Clinic.Accomplishments:*Introduced data-driven statistics as part of the strategic decision making process to optimize sustainability and efficiency within the organization.*Benefited from intensive media training to appropriately select and direct media-driven conversations for positive organizational outcomes.*Launched weekly meetings for providers/clinicians to consistently communicate and engage. Show less

Quality and Risk Manager

• Dec 2014 - May 2015

Background: Responsible for creating and implementing a quality assurance and improvement program. Oversaw four advanced practice nurses. Formerly known as Options in Reproductive Care, Inc (Options Clinic).Accomplishments (prior to taking Interim Executive Director position):*Implemented rapid HIV testing, including establishing an agreement with AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin for referral of reactive results.*Introduced HIPAA and work site visits for all 7 clinic locations.*Implemented a standardized list of products to be used for cleaning and coinciding MSDS documentation.*Launched review and revision of clinic manuals.*Trained clinic staff to use and refer to CPT codes instead of non-standardized codes. Show less

Semcac Family Planning Clinic Director

• Oct 2008 - Dec 2014

Background: Responsible for numerous functions of a nurse-run, federally-funded clinic. Served rural southeastern Minnesota, 4,500 patient visits annually. Accomplishments: *Implemented electronic medical records with successful attestation to Stage 1 of meaningful use. *Initiated a process improvement committee within the larger Semcac organization. *Grew the education and outreach services to include student groups, activities and partnership with the local university. *Supervised the creation of integrating social media into marketing, outreach, and presentations. *Successfully secured grant funding from state and federal sources. *Promoted use of appropriate Medicaid waiver resources to reduce reliance on grant funding for overall sustainability of services as a safety net provider. *Recognized knowledge gap in billing of medical claims, established new vendor relationship to optimize payments. *Organized enrollment events via MNsure. *Promoted and trained staff on electronic time keeping. *Established university club: Sexual Health Awareness Group (SHAG) to promote safe sex and normalizing conversations about reproductive health. *Introduced and implemented sexually transmitted disease (STD) testing events boasting 80+ people tested in one evening. Show less

Staff RN

• Jun 2004 - Oct 2008

Accomplishments: *Cared for post thoracic surgery patients in a progressive care setting *Placed emphasis on patient advocacy while strengthening nurse-doctor relations through professional and precise communication *Participated on a multi-disciplinary pain management team *Adapted to the routine of night shift nursing Accomplishments: *Cared for post thoracic surgery patients in a progressive care setting *Placed emphasis on patient advocacy while strengthening nurse-doctor relations through professional and precise communication *Participated on a multi-disciplinary pain management team *Adapted to the routine of night shift nursing