Penny Vaughan, a founding leader of AACN, and Connie Barden, AACN chief clinical officer and AACN past president, have been influential in the leadership and evolution of the critical care nursing industry in the United States. In this conversation, Penny and Connie discuss the changing landscape of critical care nursing and what ignited the establishment of AACN.
Penny Vaughan:
My mother tells me from childhood, I would always say, “I want to be a nurse.” In my generation, we didn't have a lot of options for careers; it was teacher, secretary, nurse. Of those, I wanted to be a nurse. I have always been a caregiver. I like to help people and I just felt this inner calling that that's what I was to be and to do.
Connie Barden:
And I bet you never looked back.
Penny Vaughan:
Never.
Connie Barden:
That's a long journey from a girl who pursued her dream to become a nurse to a young woman who, probably without even knowing it, became a founder of this organization. How on earth did that happen?
Penny Vaughan:
I was a young graduate, and Baptist Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee, was opening a coronary care unit. The nurse manager asked me if I would come and be a staff nurse there. There weren't many coronary care units in our country at that time, but they were popping up. So the nurses were going from a role of following orders and tasks, to having to think about what you were doing. I really liked the idea of that independent role.
Connie Barden:
Prior to the startups of these CCUs around the country, nurses weren't allowed to do things very independently. I happened to go to University of North Carolina, and I was going to work right there at UNC Hospitals in Chapel Hill. This was in the 1970s, and there was a bit of a nursing shortage at that time. So where they had a spot was the coronary care unit. And I was thrilled to think that I could go as a new graduate right into the CCU.
Penny Vaughan:
Amazing.
Connie Barden:
And that really was my passion. Cardiac stuff.
Penny Vaughan:
Yes.
Connie Barden:
And I never looked back. I loved it. It's science, it's humanness. It's the thrill of saving a life, you know that, and the satisfaction of easing somebody's death.
Penny Vaughan:
Yes.
Connie Barden:
There are not many fields where you get to have that kind of impact.
Penny Vaughan:
Absolutely. And remember when you were a new RN, and you believed you were going to save everybody.
Connie Barden:
Oh yeah.
Penny Vaughan:
Then one day comes and you didn't, or couldn't. And, oh, that is such an awful feeling. But if you stay in nursing, we get to that point where we know that death is part of life. Everyone cannot be saved, but I didn't know that helping people to leave this life with dignity, with comfort, with peace and family being at peace about it, is one of the greatest gifts we can give people.
Connie Barden:
So here you are, one of the founders of AACN. Try and compare what it felt like when you all were creating AACN and what it feels like today.
Penny Vaughan:
Well, it was surreal. When we were starting the organization, we were just trying to find a mechanism to help nurses learn and grow. We were trying to forge that path with a more collegial relationship with our physicians that would benefit patients, families and the bedside nurse to make that true team, which was not a concept then.
The idea that this would become an organization with a membership of over 100,000 was not even on our radar. And so living it in the moment, you really have no way of seeing what it might become. Your hopes are there. But it's awesome. It's awesome.
The idea that this would become an organization with a membership of over 100,000 was not even on our radar. And so living it in the moment, you really have no way of seeing what it might become. Your hopes are there. But it's awesome. It's awesome.
Connie Barden:
Thanks, Penny.
Penny Vaughan:
Thank you, Connie.
This conversation is provided courtesy of StoryCorps, a national nonprofit whose mission is to preserve and share humanity’s stories in order to build connections between people and create a more just and compassionate world. www.storycorps.org