UD ‘82
Healthcare Nurse Leader

   Sharon L. Anderson, R.N., B.S.N., M.S., FACHE, is the Senior Vice President for Quality, Patient Safety, and Population Health Management and the Director for the Center for Quality and Safety of the Value Institute at Christiana Care Health System. Under her leadership, Christiana Care has achieved national recognition related to several patient safety and quality initiatives, including Truven Health Analytics Everest and 100 Top Hospitals Award, the Joint Commission’s prestigious Ernest A. Codeman Award, and Top rankings in Leapfrog’s Hospital Safety Score.
   Ms. Anderson has helped develop several new programs to address the full continuum of cancer care, including prevention, screening, surveillance, diagnosis and treatment, management of complications and end-of-life issues. She won the WHYY Community Caring Award for her innovative work in cancer care. She has experience working in a health plans and developed case, care and disease management programs for both commercial and Medicaid populations. Ms. Anderson is also a recipient of ACHE’s Regent’s Award in recognition of her contributions to excellence in healthcare management. She earned a bachelor’s degree in nursing from the University of Delaware and a Master’s of Science Degree in Health Services Administration from The New School for Social Research in New York. Ms. Anderson is a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives and has obtained additional certifications in healthcare quality and utilization management.

UD ’88
Transformational Pediatric Clinical
Nurse Leader

UD ‘78 ’81
Military Hero 
Nurse Legend

Real Warrior

 UD ‘86 ’12
Emergency Clinical Nurse Leader
Blue Hens Star

Patricia Blair has worked as a student nurse extern, staff nurse, assistant nurse manager, preceptor,mentor,nursing instructor,advanced nurse practitioner, and nurse manager. She has given numerous lectures and served on countless committees; she is presently the treasurer of the Delaware Emergency Association and participates nationally with the ENA. She is a member of Sigma Theta Tau and is an adjunct professor for the University of Delaware’s Nursing Program.
 

UD ‘ 86
Transformational Nursing Visionary

Nomination

UD ’70 ’97
Leader in Service
Blue Hen Educator, Star, and Legend

“Roles of baccalaureate and master’s prepared nurses need to expand and evolve rather quickly to take care of diverse populations needing preventive and therapeutic care throughout Delaware’s communities. I believe UD Nursing must and can be the voice of nursing and a leader in health care reform, collaborating with other partners. As a 1970 BSN graduate of UD College of Nursing, a professor at UD for 18 years after 20 years of nursing practice in Delaware, I often look back on the changes over last 50 years of nursing. I am very excited and encouraged about what is happening now in healthcare. Baccalaureate- and Masters-prepared nurses will have more opportunities to excel in their practices resulting in significant changes in the quality/effectiveness of care, patient/client/family partnerships, and costs of care.”

UD ’97 ’99 ’15
Anesthesiology Clinical Nurse Leader
Delaware Hero

UD ’87
Perinatal Clinical Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star

UD ‘91 ‘09
Clinical Nurse Education Leader

UD ‘74 ‘79 ’88
Transformational Nursing Legend
Blue Hen Legend

UD ’95
Psychiatric Clinical Nurse Leader
Blue Hens Educator

“The 50th marks a historic milestone in UD Nursing’s history.  We pause to reflect on how far we have come and we dream of where we would like to be!” 

UD ’84
Women’s Health Clinical Nurse Leader
Delaware Hero

 Congratulatory Newsletter

With more than thirty years experience working as a nurse and a midwife in hospital and birthing center environments, Dorinda Dove’s gentle and thoughtful manner inspires confidence in birthing families. As OB/Gyn faculty, she taught at Baylor College of Medicine. She graduated summa cum laude with a BSN from the University of Delaware and was awarded an MS in Nurse Midwifery at SUNY Stonybrook. She is a member of the American College of Nurse Midwives and the Delaware Perinatal Cooperative task force. Dorinda published the results of a research study on the efficacy of using Evening Primrose Oil during pregnancy. Dorinda also worked with the Peace Corps helping to implement and evaluate the oral rehydration program for children in Malawi, Africa.

“I love sharing the joy and excitement of an expectant family and feel it’s a privilege to be a part of their experience here.”

UD ’66
Healthcare Nurse Leader
50th Class Star Legend

UD ‘87
Anesthesia Clinical Nurse Leader
Military Star

CV

    Capt. Gibbs, a Dover High School graduate, is a 1987 Bachelor of Nursing graduate of the University of Delaware and 1999 Master of Science graduate of Georgetown University. She currently practices in Virginia as a Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist (CRNA). Recently promoted to the rank of Captain, 0-6, she is the Officer in Charge of one of the largest detachments in the Expeditionary Medical Facility (EMF) Bethesda, Maryland. Her detachment trains at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and performs surgery as a stand-alone surgical unit. It is the only unit of its kind in the Navy. She has 22 years of Navy service and has served at duty stations around the world. Deployed to Afghanistan in 2013, Capt. Gibbs served as Senior CRNA for a 20 member combat medical support team.   
Capt. Gibbs was awarded the Army Bronze Star for her service. She is the mother of three adult children, a grandmother of three, and currently resides in Chesapeake, Virginia. Her father retired from the United States Air Force and her husband Ed, has 20 years of service in the United States Marine Corps.

UD ’70
Delaware Hero
Blue Hen Star and Legend

Patricia Lynch Haas graduated from the University of Delaware in 1970 with a BSN degree and acquired her RN certification license immediately following graduation. Patti’s 40+ year nursing career has been very diversified. Her first employment was at Wilmington General Hospital. At this first RN nursing position she was assigned to numerous divisions of the hospital to include: emergency room, general floor nurse, ICU , and CCU. From Wilmington General Patti followed her husband’s employment with the University of Maryland and soon was an employee of the hospital – Peninsula General in Salisbury, Maryland. Again following her husband’s University of Maryland employment promotion to Cecil County, Maryland, Patti positioned herself from the hospital to private practice nursing. She later applied for a position at the University of Delaware Student Health Service. Patti acquired the RN position and made a 20 year University career retiring as Associate Director of Nursing in 2004. Patti Haas is now an RN nurse for Beebe Hospital.

UD ‘81
Transformational Informatics Nurse Leader
Blue Hens Star

UD ‘64 ’71
Nursing Education Leader
Blue Hen Star, Educator, and Legend

Mary Lou Hamilton has been a nurse educator for 47 years. Her positions have included an instructor at St. Francis Hospital, a University of Delaware Assistant Professor in Nursing, and instructor in nursing at Delaware Tech Community College in Stanton, De. Her primary area of expertise is Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing. She was a clinical specialist in Psychiatric nursing at St. Francis Hospital. She is active in Sigma Theta Tau and has been a member of the Continuing Education Committee of the Delaware Nursing Association for many years has been co-chair of the committee. She is currently an art student at Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at the University of Delaware.

UD ’73
Healthcare Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Legend

Valerie Hardy-Sprinkle is a highly motivated, proficient senior nursing leader with progressive and diverse experience in the healthcare field, both at the hospital and system level.  She has expertise in building and strengthening professional nursing practice environments, strategic planning, program development, systems integration, organizational development and acute-care operations. She is a visionary leader and a change agent with a strong commitment to the professional practice of nursing.

UD ’81 ’85 ‘04
Pediatric Nursing Education Leader
Blue Hens Educator and Star

CV

UD ‘85 ‘94
Nursing Education Leader

UD ’77 ‘83 ’00
Educational Leader and Visionary
Delaware Hero and Legend

Nomination

UD ’93
Global Nurse Education Leader
Blue Hen Educator

UD ’78
Transformational Spiritual Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Legend

Karen Jones graduated from the University of Delaware with a BSN and practiced until becoming a pastor and receiving a degree from Wesley Theological Seminary.  Throughout her years as a pastor, she has practiced at camps, church retreats, and in hospice care.  Throughout her life, she has made many contributions to the community and to friends and family through not only her nursing career, but her life as pastor.  She integrates the care that she learned at UD into each aspect of her life.  It takes a special kind of nurse to do hospice care and she has made a difference in the lives of so many.

UD ’62
Transformational Nursing Legend

UD ‘83 ‘88
Healthcare Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star

Biographical Profile

UD ’96
Healthcare Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star

UD ‘92 ‘97
Geriatric Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star

UD ’83
Leader in Service
Child Advocate Hero

CNN Hero
Biographical Profile

UD ‘77 ’94
National School Nurse Leader
Delaware Hero
Blue Hen Star and Legend

Twitter – @bethmattey

“School nursing, a specialized practice of public health nursing, protects and promotes student health, facilitates normal development, and advances academic success. School nurses, grounded in ethical and evidence-based practice, are the leaders that bridge health care and education, provide care coordination, advocate for quality student-centered care, and collaborate to design systems that allow individuals and communities to develop their full potentials. NASN, 2016.”

    Elizabeth Mattey is an out of the box thinker; always pushing her colleagues to expand their practice. She was a leader as school nurse at Mt.pleasant HS, a teacher and mentor to new school nurses through the induction program and now has the opportunity to influence the practice of tens of thousands of school nurses as President of the National Association of School Nurses (NASN).
    As the new leader of this organization, she is forging partnerships with multiple national education and healthcare organizations and promoting the use of social media among members. She has also been recognized by the State of Delaware as the School Nurse of the Year. In addition to her role as a Delaware School Nurse, she serves as adjunct faculty for the UD School of Nursing, School Nurse Certificate program.

UD ’73
Military Hero
Blue Hen Star and Legend

Biographical Profile

UD ‘88
Maternal Child Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star

    Michele Savin, MSN, NNP, graduated from the University of Delaware in 1988 with a BSN. She started working in the Neonatal ICU in 1989. She received her MSN degree as a neonatal nurse practitioner from the University of Pennsylvania in 1992 and practiced at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital from 1992 until returning to Christiana Care in 1998. She currently is pursuing a doctor of nursing practice (DNP) degree. In 2012 she returned to Jefferson as coordinator of the Neonatal Nurse Practitioner Program, and now splits her time between there and Christiana Care. She is involved in local and national nursing and advocacy organizations, speaks professionally to local and national audiences, serves as a review editor for Advances in Neonatal Nursing, and is an Editorial Advisory Board member for Healthy Mom and Baby Magazine. She was the recipient of the Academy of Neonatal Nurses’ 2015 Excellence in Neonatal Nursing Practice Award at the National Neonatal Nurses Conference in Orlando.

UD ’83
Nurse-Attorney Forensics Leader
Delaware Hero
Blue Hen Star

Biographical Profile

   When the CBS CSI: Crime Scene Investigation series premiered on October 6, 2000, nurse-attorney Lisa B. Schwind, CHNS’83 had already combined her legal and medical science expertise to pioneer the creation of the novel Forensic and Education Unit in the Delaware Public Defender’s Office as highlighted in the 2005 cover story of the UD Messenger, “Merging Law With Medicine”. Lisa’s unit continues to provide invaluable assistance and insight in addressing forensic and medical needs of clients represented by her office. Lisa’s expertise in legal forensic matters has been recognized nationally by her 2010 appointment to the 20 member Technical Working Group on Biological Evidence Preservation, a joint initiative of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the National Institute of Justice (NIJ).  Lisa’s expertise in legal forensic matters was also recognized by her 2014 appointment to the Delaware Forensic Science Commission. Not only has Lisa earned a J.D Degree (Widener’89) and a Master of Science Nursing (Wesley’10) since leaving UD, Lisa has remained active as an educator, both academically as an Instructor at the Widener Legal Education Institute and professionally as head of the Public Defender Continuing Legal Education for 15 years. Likewise, Lisa’s C.V. reveals that she has  published and spoken extensively  on a wide range a variety of professional topics. Lisa has also served as a charter member of the  Innocence Network since 2000.

UD ’94
Leader in Clinical Nursing
Blue Hen Star

UD ’76
Nursing Education Leader
Blue Hen Legend

CV

   Daryl Sharp created the first national program to stop epidemic use of tobacco by people with severe mental illness, establishing psychiatric nursing as a leader in delivering evidence-based tobacco dependence interventions. She is founding chair and co-chair of the Tobacco Dependence Council of the American Psychiatric Nurses Association (APNA). She received her BSN from the University of Delaware.

UD ‘08
Pediatric Healthcare Nursing Leader

UD ’96 ‘07
Nurse-Attorney Leader
Blue Hen Star

UD ‘77 ‘05
Healthcare Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Legend

    Patricia Steingall, RN, MS, NE-BC, is Vice President of Patient Care Services and Chief Nursing Officer for Hunterdon Healthcare. She was included on Becker’s Hospital Review’s prestigious list of the 130 women hospital and health system leaders to know. She received her BSN degree from the University of Delaware, and her MS in Healthcare Services Administration also from the University of Delaware.

UD ’73 ‘84
Transformational Educator
Healthcare Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Legend

Nomination

UD ’80
Healthcare Nurse Leader

CV

“I am both proud and honored to be chosen as a Star of UD Nursing, an extraordinary recognition.”

UD ‘01 ‘05
Women’s Health Clinical Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star

    Clare Szymanski is an excellent example of the type of professional nurse that University of Delaware produces. She started her nursing career after graduating from the Nursing School of Wilmington in 1975, and after raising 4 children she went back to school at UD to pursue her Bachelors of Nursing at the same time her daughter was also enrolled in the BSN program. Together they graduated in 2001.  After many years of Labor and Delivery nursing and a renewed interest in education Clare pursued her MSN as a WHNP at Delaware. She graduated and began working at CCHS OB/GYN residency program. She was not only a great mentor to the new NPs but helped teach the residents the art and science of maternity care. After several years of outpatient care Clare began working for All About Women and quickly developed a huge following of patients that loved her honest, open nature and the exceptional care she provided. She decided to pursue a life long dream of becoming a midwife and graduated from Frontier School of Midwifery and Family Nursing in 2008 with a post masters certificate in midwifery. She was the first midwife in private practice to be allowed to deliver CCHS and has acted as mentor and preceptor to many aspiring midwifes since then. She is in high demand as a clinical preceptor for not only UD FNP students but Widener, University of Penn, and several on line degree programs.
    Clare’s commitment to bedside nursing and excellence in clinical care are obvious to all her patients and those she has mentored. She has worked tirelessly to decrease fetal mortality in the state by not only providing excellent care to her patients but by serving on the State of Delaware Fetal Infant Mortality Review team for New Castle County. She also serves on the Maternal Mortality Review team for Delaware reviewing each maternal death in the state to search for health disparities and suggest better use of resources  to prevent maternal mortality. Clare exemplifies the role of professional nurse.

UD ’09
Clinical Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star

UD ‘89
Healthcare Nurse Leader
Delaware Hero
Blue Hen Legend

Personal Reflection of My Life as a Nurse

UD ‘93 ’97
Pediatric Healthcare Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star

UD ‘81
National Anesthesiology
Clinical Nurse Leader

UD ‘75
Pharmaceutical Research Nurse Leader
Blue Hen Star and Legend

UD ‘99
Healthcare Nurse Leader
Delaware Hero
Blue Hen Star

UD ‘76
Leader in Women’s Health and Nurse Education
Global Nursing Leader
Blue Hen Legend

    Phyllis W. Sharps, CHS ’76/M, an associate professor and director of the master’s program at the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing, is a national recognized researcher on African-American women’s responses to intimate partner violence and health disparities related to maternal and child health. Sharps, who holds bachelor’s and doctoral degrees in nursing from the University of Maryland, received a Meritorious Service Medal upon her retirement from the U.S. Army. Before joining Johns Hopkins in 2001, she coordinated the women’s health graduate program at the University of Maryland School of Nursing and the maternal-child health track at George Washington University’s School of Public Health.
    Applying her clinical research findings to improve women’s health, Sharps serves on the advisory board for the International Association of Chiefs of Police and as trainer and consultant for the Family Violence Prevention Fund and the National Institutes of Justice.
     An active donor to the University, Sharps has said that UD’s strong academic graduate nursing program provided her with the foundation she needed to excel in academia and research. She continues to maintain relationships with her UD colleagues and faculty mentors. Sharps was named an American Academy of Nursing Fellow in 2003, Outstanding Nurse Educator in 1999 by the Maryland Nurses Association and “Health Care Heroes Finalist” in 2005 by Maryland’s Daily Record, for her efforts to improve nursing care for battered women. The Laurel, Md., resident also serves as an ad hoc reviewer for The Lancet, Public Health Nursing and the American Journal of Preventive Medicine and has presented her work nationally and in international forums, frequently as the keynote speaker. She and her husband, Milton, reside in Laurel, Maryland.

“I am proud to be an alumnus of the University of Delaware! The advanced practice nursing education I received at the University was innovative, creative, and challenging. The faculty were outstanding teachers, mentors and role models. They inspired me to achieve excellence as a scholar, clinician and educator. I am sure that my accomplishments and the leadership roles I have achieved in my nursing career are directly related to the high quality education I received at the University. Thank you for this tremendous honor I will always be thankful for the educational and clinical foundation that began at the University of Delaware.” –PWS

UD ‘79
School Nurse Leader
Delaware Hero
Blue Hen Legend

Linda Wolf is past President of the National Association of School Nurses during which time she provided strong leadership for over 68,000 school nurses in the U.S., initiated the first comprehensive textbook in school nursing, and initiated an endowment fund to promote nursing research. She is currently responsible for school health in the State of Delaware through the Department of Education. In this role, she is the liaison between all school nurses in the state with the Department of Education. She also crafted the current School Nurse Certification program.

UD ‘09
Rising Geriatric Research Leader