To my colleagues and peers,

I am proud and honored to be the interim Chief Nursing Executive.

I consider it a privilege to represent such an outstanding nursing staff.

I look forward to getting to know you and I want to hear how we can continue our initiative to be the strongest nursing staff around.

For those of you who do not know anything about me, here goes......I am a wife, a mother x1, a sister x2 and a daughter. I love Shepherd Center and its mission. I have worked at Shepherd for 32 years.

I worked inpatient for 17 years as a staff nurse, charge nurse, special project nurse, manager and I am an enterostomal therapist. I have been in the Outpatient arena 15 years.

My nursing philosophy is simple: “treat every patient like they were your mama” (that is if you love your mama):).

I know Shepherd nurses have adopted Virginia Henderson as our nurse theorist, but I also want to share a quote from one of my favorite nurse theorist, Patricia Benner:

"Listen to your own voice; listen to what you’re doing in your practice. Take it seriously, have the courage to be an innovator in your practice. Talk about what you do, in story form, and do not allow your practice to be silenced. Reflect on what you do and where you find moral anguish, name it and have the courage to take this work seriously in the midst of incredibly difficult bureaucratic structures that don’t always take the work seriously. Never accept the crass commercialism that says we don’t have enough money to care. We don’t have enough money not to care.”

Thank you and please do not hesitate to invite me to any meetings you think are appropriate. I appreciate Gary Ulicny’s decision to continue to support the nursing staff by appointing an interim CNE. Please call me at my extension, 7724, e-mail me or call my cell phone 404-405-9827.

Tammy King RN,MSN,CCM,CRRN
Interim Chief Nursing Executive