Chapter 6: Learning the Complexities of Nursing Care
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Description
Dr. Summers talks about working at the Greater Southeast Community Hospital after receiving her Master’s. At this inner city hospital she focused on oncology and pain management and worked with great oncologists and physicians. She talks about the impact of working with patients in extreme poverty. She also recalls being nicknamed “LP” for Leader of the Pack –indication that her leadership impulse showed—and she started to see the impact she might have on nursing from a position of leadership.
Identifier
SummersB_01_20140123_C06
Publication Date
1-23-2014
Publisher
The Making Cancer History® Voices Oral History Collection, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
City
Houston, Texas
Interview Session
Barbara Summers, PhD, Oral History Interview, January 23, 2014
Topics Covered
The Interview Subject's Story - Professional Path Professional Path Influences from People and Life Experiences Offering Care, Compassion, Help Patients Leadership Mentoring The Professional at Work
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Disciplines
History of Science, Technology, and Medicine | Oncology | Oral History
Transcript
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
So tell me about that moment—you’ve gotten your master’s. Did you feel like that program had changed you in a way and you were kind of reentering the profession, in a sense, with new eyes and a different set of goals, maybe?
Barbara Summers, PhD:
The program changed me in that I came to the realization that I could positively impact the outcomes that care for groups of patients. That definitely happened. I think also I took a position after graduation in an inner-city community hospital in Washington, D.C. that cared for a very poor population and cared for individuals that had limited to no access to preventative healthcare. So all of the people that we took care of were sick with advanced stages of illness that it was very sad because if they had had healthcare available, it may not have occurred. And my focus was in oncology and also on pain management. So I felt very privileged to be able to be a part of the lives of those patients and to—you know, at that time I really came to recognize that I could not alter what had happened to them in their lives before they came into my life, but working with them, I could help to change everything that happened afterwards. So that was just phenomenal. And I had the opportunity to work with some fabulous oncologists, physicians, who I respected and they respect me, worked with some absolutely wonderful nurses. I worked with some fabulous colleagues who were also clinical nurse specialists, and we all shared the same boss, the same director, who was a very good mentor, who has come in and out of my life at various periods, and I’ll talk about her. But the team of clinical nurse specialists was great because we each had our area of focus. One was on Pediatrics and one was on the Emergency Room, and I was on Oncology and Pain and Medical Unit, and one was in Critical Care. So we would have team-based initiatives and projects. I remember one day that I was meeting with my colleagues, and one of them called me “LP,” and I said, “Well, what is LP?” She said, “Leader of the pack.” (Rosolowski laughs.) I said, “I am not the leader of the pack.” And she said, “Oh, yes, you are.” She said, “You are so leader of the pack.” So it’s like, “Oh, okay. Well, then, if you’re the LP, then you have start acting like an LP.” So it was just a wonderful experience, you know, making a difference in lives of very underserved patients and working with colleagues who were committed as I was to improving the health outcomes of these patients. That was great. And, you know, never in my very protected life was I exposed to that kind of poverty or the impact of that kind of poverty ever. I mean, seeing teenagers coming into the emergency room who were actively in labor, who had no idea they were pregnant, or seeing women who were presenting with an open lesion on their breast that was a breast cancer from a cancer that had presented as a lump two years before, and they just hadn’t done anything about it, to working with individuals who had sickle cell anemia and who would come into the hospital in sickle cell crisis, in tremendous pain, and then being able to contribute to developing a plan of care for their pain management. So that was terrific and I enjoyed it.
Recommended Citation
Summers, Barbara PhD and Rosolowski, Tacey A. PhD, "Chapter 6: Learning the Complexities of Nursing Care" (2014). Interview Chapters. 1243.
https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1243
Conditions Governing Access
Open
