APRIL Member Spotlight
Meet Heather Fitzhugh-Boehm, MSN-Ed, RN Heather started as a Nurse Scheduler with MedStar Home Infusion before becoming an ICU Resident at Harbor Hospital, later transferring to her dream job in skilled home care. She worked her way up from case managing and precepting to teaching, mentoring, and leading an interprofessional clinical education team that covers about 350 clinical associates throughout Maryland, DC, and Northern Virginia. Heather enjoys spending time with her family, figure skating, and hiking. Her synchronized skating team received a bronze medal at the Eastern Synchronized Skating Sectional Championships in New Hampshire this year. |
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What is your involvement with MNCHA? What caused you to join?
"MedStar Health Home Care has been a member of MNCHA for some time. Heather became actively involved with MNCHA last year during the annual conference when she was a break-out room presenter for the first time. Her topic, “Advancing the skilled home care nursing workforce through student nurse externships and RN residencies” sparked a lot of discussion about how we can promote student-to-RN Pathways in home care."
What is one thing you find special about MNCHA’s community?
"I enjoy how diverse the MNCHAs member base is. I attended a mixer where I was able to network with many other home care and DME providers. Some skilled and others private duty. We were able to identify common challenges and discuss best practices for overcoming issues with education, staffing, and electronic visit verification which was new to our organization at the time."
Are there any partnerships, collaboration efforts, or projects you have found most meaningful in the last year?
"I enjoy all the pop-up events MNCHA hosts and the flexibility that we have as an organization to have team members attend. I thought the educational session, “How to Provide Compliant Maintenance Therapy” was just in time. The OASIS education coming from experts who partner with the association is meaningful to our organization and keeps us current."
What’s the biggest challenge you’ve faced in relation to work? How did you overcome that?
"The biggest challenge I face is having enough experienced nursing preceptors who have a passion for teaching. Not only does it take a great preceptor to fully train staff, but the preceptors need to have soft skills and be able to give meaningful feedback. It is hard to find the total package in a preceptor. We have overcome this by using novice and expert preceptors. However, this model comes with the challenge of continuity and time constraints. I look forward to the next MNCHA networking session so I can get your ideas."
What motivates you, in life and at work?
"I am passionate about promoting the skilled home care workforce and have worked with my organization to promote academic practice partnerships with local universities and schools of nursing. I still provide patient care on a PRN basis to give back to the community I am a part of and promote population health while empowering people to take control of their wellness journey. Ultimately, my family motivates me to be the best version of myself. I want my children to look up to me and have a strong work ethic. I hope that they find their future work as meaningful as I do mine."
Can you share one piece of advice you would give to someone considering a career in the homecare/ healthcare field?
"Follow your passion! If you know your calling is community health, fight for it! I applied to work in home care three times before I finally had enough acute/critical care experience to be considered. I knew before I went to nursing school that community health was my calling. Even though they said I did not have enough experience I remained resilient, continued working to get that experience, and continued applying until someone believed in me."