A great time Celebrating 50 years of NP service and 6 yrs of MBNPA

To those of our group who missed our annual celebration I am enclosing a few of my thoughts. There were 25 people including 2 students and 3 fairly new grads. Our most experienced member had been an NP since the 80's. Our members work in peoples homes, and in the hospital. Some have their own practice, some work for large groups, and some have retired. Our practices cover Family Practice, Internal medicine, Pediatrics, Emergency and Urgent Care, Cardiology, Pulmonology, Hospitalists and education. The food was wonderful, the company superb. Here are some highlights:
This week we celebrate National Nurse Practitioner Week, and this year we are Celebrating 50 Years of NP Practice

Fifty years ago, at the University of Colorado, the first NP
program was established, and now there are more than 205,000 NPs licensed to practice in the United States. Last year more than 916 million patient visits were made to Nurse Practitioners. We have all been busy

We are a diverse group, but we are one in purpose, to care for the people in our community. We practice in clinics, private offices, schools, hospitals, stores, and people's homes. We practice on the reservations, in the universities, and in the military. We are midwives, Nurse Practitioners, Nurse Anesthetists, and clinical nurse specialists. We are generalists and specialists, from family practice, adult health, to gerontology and pediatrics. We are in every specialty from Occupational Health to Emergency Care, Urgent care. We deal with people in the full spectrum of life from before birth to death.

We are blessed to be working in the great state of Washington, one of 21 states that allows us to practice to the full extent of our experience and education.

Here in Whatcom County several NP's gathered together to support each other, as many of us were the lone NP's in our practices. 6 years ago we formally incorporated into the Mt Baker Nurse Practitioner Association as a non profit professional association. Since our inception we have had over a hundred people join our organization, with about 50 active members (paid their dues – and yes that means that about half have either not paid their dues or have moved away/ retired.) We have held dozens of educational classes, with free CEU's for our members, help sponsored what is commonly referred to as "drug rep dinners", been active with our sister/parent organizations (ARNP's united and AANP), help facilitate preceptership of NP students, and promoted the public face of NP's in our community.

Last year there were over 17,000 nurses who became NP's in the US. When we precept these students we make a difference in profession. I've heard from one student whose comments I would like to pass on about preceptors:
Thank you for everything you taught me and all the differences you make in all of our lives! I really enjoyed learning from you and wish I was still working with you! You are an amazing, brilliant and compassionate NP and I truly miss being apart of your team and learning from you. I am so grateful for the time I had with you. So THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!

And then there are our patients:

I was talking to a friend of mine and she brought up how she loved her NP. She credited her for saving her life several times. She said she counted her as a friend, someone who listened, who didn't make her feel small when she asked her questions, who took the time to explain things, and never talked down to her. She then went on that she was upset because she left to go teach, and that she knew she would be a good teacher, but she missed her. She now has a doctor, even a woman doctor, but it isn't the same. Our patient's love us.

We are different from Doctors, people may have difficulty explaining the difference, but it is apparent to them.