Hello to all:

I go by my middle name of Gayle. I’ve been nurisng since since 1984.  I started my nursing career in a med/surg. inpatient small community hospital in my home town of Leavenworth.  After 2 years I transfered to the Women’s Center in the same community hospital and started my specialized nurisng of the OB world and women’s services. Over the years I have worked in level 1 and 2 OB units. I have been involved with labor/delivery, antepartum, triage, mother/baby and women’s services.  My community hospital closed its OB unit about 7 years ago which has landed me at my current home,  Advent Health Shawnee Mission. I signed a contract  to obtain my BSN within 5 years, thus my journey of RN to BSN began. Including this class, I have 4 left. I work on the labor/delivery floor with the antepartum patients. We have about 5000 deliveries per year. I very much enjoy what I do at the bedside. I have no interest in obtaining any further degrees or advancing into management. I’m 60 years old and I just plan on continuing to be a good worker bee until retirement.

Outside of work, I’m a wife of 40 years, mother to 3 adult daughters and Nana to 6 grandchildren. I’m blessed to still have my parents as well. I have 2 sets of parents, all in their 80’s with typical 80 year old health issues. I have lots of extended family as well that all live nearby.  My family, full time job and school keep me plently busy and entertained. I am truely looking forward to putting school to bed so I can not only be a better nurse but  a better wife, daughter and Nana as well.

As far as research in my role of nursing there are numerous evidenced base practices that we are always striving to improve and implement in the OB world. Some of these are: 1)  OB Pre-Eclampsia Hyptertensive protocal 2) Massive hemorrhage protocal , 3) Implementation of Evidence Based Practice on the use of Oxytocin, 4) Skin to skin including cesarean sections, delayed bath of the newborn, early breast-feeding. 5) The use of betamethasone for mothers threatening to delivery preterm. 6) Prevention of elective deliveries before 39 weeks and 7) the use of Magnesium Sulfate for fetal neuroprotection. I don’t think that many people are aware that the United States has the highest maternal mortality rate in the developed world with women of color dying at a rate 3-4x that of white women. Initiating these protocals  and improving on maternity care in the United States is a must to get these numbers down. 1/2 of all maternal deaths in the United States are preventable, but not unless we improve our care and implement evidence based protocals in all birthing centers in all 50 states.

Recently Shawnee mission has obtained Magnet Status, Recognized as a  Baby- Friendly Hospital and the Designation of receiving the title of Perinatal Center of Excellence.

Look forward to hearing all about my classmates and their journeys

Gayle