Meet Betsy Whitmore
In this edition of Q&A with Alumni, we met Betsy Whitmore, BSN’79, post-graduate certificate in ANP ‘97. Whitmore says that her clinical rotation while a student at Duke University School of Nursing (DUSON) prepared her to be a professional nurse, an advanced practice nurse and now an administrator.
Q: How do you feel Duke prepared you for a career in nursing?
A: As a 1979 graduate of the BSN program, I did not realize fully at the time of my graduation, how well Duke prepared me to be a professional nurse, an advanced practice nurse and now an administrator. I never worked as a professional nursing assistant while I was at Duke, so my clinical knowledge and skill set were what I learned in our clinical rotations. Let’s just say I was not overly prepared task-wise when I took my first position as a staff RN on a busy 47 bed cardiovascular surgery stepdown at an academic medical center in Chicago.
It was the height of the nursing shortage, and wherever I went, even with no actual experience, I was offered a job on the spot, including intensive care unit positions! We practiced primary nursing, so as RNs, we did it all for our patients: beds, baths, trays, emptied trash and so on.
I swiftly mastered all the “tasky” stuff on my unit and eventually became a preceptor, an assistant unit leader, and earned my master’s at Rush University. I became an instructor at Rush University College of Nursing, where I always made sure my students learned how to give an enema, but more importantly that they learned how to be a nurse who knows more than how to do tasks.
My career has taken me from Chicago to northern Illinois where I had a brief stint as a senior level nursing instructor at a diploma program (culture shock), and then to North Carolina where I worked for many years in my favorite role, a clinical nurse specialist, where my Duke education was used every single day to make a difference in the lives of my patients and the staff who cared for them. I now work as a practice administrator where besides running a busy surgical practice, I supervise RNs, advanced practice providers, perfusionists and non-clinical staff.
Q: How do you stay connected to Duke and Duke School of Nursing?
A: I live locally, and am a season ticket holder for football. Before the games, I tailgate with Duke friends. I attend as many reunions as I can get to, and I also keep in touch and vacation often with a cadre of my nursing classmates.
Q: What piece of advice do you have for new alumni just graduating from Duke?
A: If you do what’s right for the patient (and we all know what that is, in our hearts), you will never go wrong, and it’s not as easy as it sounds!