Health Affairs Committee Closing Out 2022
By Donna L. Hamby
January to December 2022 kept the GAPNA’s Health Affairs Committee very active. We focused on identifying bills that affect our patient population and advanced practice registered nurses. Working with other organizations through coalitions enabled more than 40 letters to be sent to legislators and regulatory authorities with GAPNA as author or co-author. Another focus was to educate the membership on the various ways to advocate.
We achieved this by presenting at the GAPNA Annual Conference and developing the Health Affairs Toolkit.
Culminating the year, Lois Chappell was selected as the Health Affairs Scholarship winner at the 2023 AANP Conference. Lois is a nurse practitioner with Optum. Her volunteer time is spent as a director-at-large with the Liberty Chapter and president of the local Pennsylvania Coalition of Nurse Practitioners Chapter.
As the chapter president, Lois is active in the policy campaign committee and was the legislative representative for six years. Lois shares her perspective on advocacy:
I have had a deep-rooted passion in health policy stimulated initially by my father, a lifelong political guru, and my mentor, of 10 years, Dr. Lori Martin Plank. Nurse practitioners are recognized leaders in their field. We have an opportunity and obligation to advance our profession and protect our patients by being aware of health policy issues and promoting practice through advocating activities.
Advocating for our profession and patients takes knowledge and practice. As I develop and grow in my role as both a nurse leader and policy advocate, I hope to impact others to be involved in advocacy efforts. As a leader, provider, and educator, staying abreast of changes in the healthcare arena are essential to my efforts and ability to transform healthcare. Networking and collaborating with policy and healthcare leaders is an impactful way to expand my knowledge and ability to make a difference for our patients and profession.
If you desire to participate in healthcare advocacy, please consider joining the Health Affairs Committee’s virtual meeting on the first Tuesday of each month. A Zoom meeting link is published in the GAPNA Exchange the day before the meeting.
Donna L. Hamby, DNP, ACNP-BC, RN, DEGN
rdlh2011@gmail.com