AACN Inland Northwest Chapter Spring Symposium

Boot camp style CCRN & PCCN Review Course Author of “Ace the CCRN” & “Ace the PCCN” Review books Cardiac Medicine (CMC) & Cardiac Surgery (CSC) Review Course YouTube Channel: Nicole Kupchik TikTok & Instagram: @nicolekupchik

Barbara McLean has been in critical care practice for 35 years. She functions as an independent, inter-national Critical Care Practice Consultant. She participates as part of the critical care team as an objective observer of patient care, guiding with classroom and bedside education as well as consults. Her practice is enriched with her Guest Lecture activity at the Emory University School of Medicine and as a Clinical Faculty member of the Emory University School of Nursing in Atlanta, Georgia. Ms McLean is a member of many professional organizations including the American Association of Critical Care Nurses (AACN), the Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM) and the American Association of Surgery and Trauma. She has been awarded the excellence in education award by the AACN and the SCCM has presented her with presidential citations for her volunteer efforts. She has also authored or co-authored numerous journal articles, abstracts and book chapters and has made more than 2000 presentations nationally and internationally. Her research has been focused on blood flow and oxygenation and she continues to expand her knowledge every day in her international clinical practice.

Dr. Cristy Smith is a cardiothoracic surgeon and the surgical director for the Providence Heart Transplant and Mechanical Circulatory Support programs. Dr. Smith performs a broad range of cardiac surgeries with an emphasis on surgical treatments for heart failure that include placement of left ventricular assist devices (LVADs), heart transplants, total artificial heart surgery and placement of extracorporeal membranous oxygenation (ECMO). Completing her cardiac fellowship at the University of Arizona, Dr. Smith trained in heart failure surgery under Jack Copeland, M.D., one of the leaders in heart transplantation and creator of the Cardiowest total artificial heart. Dr. Smith stayed on at the University of Arizona and continued to further her passion for heart failure surgery rising to director of transplant and mechanical devices until 2013. She brought that expertise to the Pacific Northwest where she established an LVAD/ECMO program on the west side of Washington State. Dr. Smith returned to her transplant roots when she assumed the role of surgical director for heart transplant and mechanical circulatory support at Providence Heart Institute in Spokane. She is dedicated to furthering the advancements of our Spokane programs with her continued work in minimally invasive LVAD therapy and the latest technologies in heart transplantation and life support. Dr. Smith has received numerous honors and awards in recognition of her achievements. She shares her knowledge with providers and consumers on topics ranging from post-op care of cardiac patients and heart disease in women to frontiers in minimally invasive placement of LVADs. In 2021, Spokane Coeur d’Alene Living Magazine named Dr. Smith a top doctor in the region.

Rebekah Marsh, BSN, RN, CCRN, serves as president-elect of the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) from July 1, 2024, through June 30, 2025. She served a three-year term as a director on the AACN board from July 1, 2020, through June 30, 2023. She also held a one-year term as secretary from July 1, 2022, to June 30, 2023. Marsh is a clinical nurse educator for acute care/telemetry at Harborview Medical Center, University of Washington (UW) Medicine, Seattle. She also serves as an advisor to nursing shared governance councils and supports evidence-based practice being led from the bedside. She previously worked as a clinical staff nurse in the Harborview Neuroscience ICU. The recipient of an AACN Clinical Scene Investigator (CSI) Academy staff nurse grant (October 2014-January 2016), she followed the learn-one, do-one, teach-one model by taking the next step to embed CSI concepts in her organization’s process improvement structure. She has also been a member of CSI Academy Influencers since its inception in 2016; she says that networking with other CSI Academy alumni from around the country provides a forum for meaningful connections and discussing the advancement of nurse-led quality improvement projects. She also co-facilitated the daylong NTI preconference on AACN CSI Academy concepts for several years and advocates that front-line nurses have the insight to transform their environment if given the time and resources. A member of AACN’s Mountain to Sound Chapter since 2016, her other affiliations include serving on the board of directors of the Seattle Nursing Research Consortium to advance nurse- led research in the Seattle region and hosting an annual conference and workshop. She is a member of the American Nurses Association, Association for Nursing Professional Development, Academy of Medical-Surgical Nurses and Sigma. In 2024, she was nominated as Harborview Nurse Leader of the Year for leading her organization to implement the AACN Healthy Work Environment Standards. An accomplished speaker on how nurses can lead from the bedside, she is also co-author of “Validation of the Critical-Care Pain Observation Tool-Neuro in Brain Injured Adults in the Intensive Care Unit,” in Journal of Critical Care, April 2021. She was recognized as a 2020 UW Distinguished Staff Award nominee, with letters provided from staff nurses endorsing her as a “nurse’s nurse.” Marsh earned a Bachelor of Science in Nursing at UW School of Nursing, Seattle. Before studying nursing, she had a background in fine arts and finds melding the science of nursing with her artist’s background to be a source of professional and personal inspiration. In 2022 and 2023, she designed the Nurses’ Week artwork for Harborview Medical Center. Marsh’s ECG courses include references to classic paintings and kinetic dance movements as a way of helping learners begin to understand the art of ECG interpretation.

Dr Bridges has over 40 years of experience in critical care. She is a professor emeritus from the University of Washington School of Nursing and in January 2024 she also retired as the Clinical Nurse Researcher at the University of Washington Medical Center. She is also a retired colonel of the United States Air Force Nurse Corps, including serving in Afghanistan. Liz volunteered for over 10 years for the AACN Certification Corporation, she served on the AACN Board of Directors and in 2020-2021 (during the pandemic) she was the President of the American Association of Critical Care Nurses. Her research focuses on the care of patients during long-distance military aeromedical evacuation and austere operational settings and the integration of hemodynamics into the care of critically ill patients. She is the editor of the TriService Nursing Research Program Battlefield and Disaster Nursing Pocket Guide, which has recently been translated into Ukrainian. Dr. Bridges is well known for her presentations on the integration of evidence into practice that integrate multiple topics related to EBP, sepsis, hemodynamics, and operational care.

After completing medical school and general surgery residency at Oregon Health Sciences University in Portland, Dr. Bax began his surgical practice in Spokane, WA in 1998. His surgical practice has covered the gamut of general surgery as well as covering trauma and acute care surgery. Currently his elective surgical practice focuses on diseases of the stomach and esophagus as well as minimally invasive surgery of the spleen and adrenal glands. He has been the Trauma Medical Director of both Sacred Heart Medical Center – the busiest level 2 trauma hospital in Washington, and Holy Family Hospital – a level 3 trauma hospital in North Spokane for the past 6 years. Dr. Bax recently complete a term as governor for the American College of Surgeons and is the immediate past president of the North Pacific Surgical Association. He remains quite busy, spending roughly half of his professional work in elective practice and the other half doing trauma and acute care surgery.

Dr. Anderson joined the Sound Physicians Critical care team in July of 219. He went to medical school at University of Washington, then came back to Spokane for 3 years of internal medicine residency plus an extra 4th year as chief resident. It was during this time that he met his wife Andrea, who was a family medicine resident at the time. He then moved to Portland for 2 years to complete Critical Care fellowship.

Kali Dayton, DNP, AGACNP, is a critical care nurse practitioner, host of the Walking Home From The ICU and Walking You Through The ICU podcasts, and critical care outcomes consultant. She is dedicated to creating Awake and Walking ICUs by ensuring ICU sedation and mobility practices are aligned with current research. She works with ICU teams internationally to transform patient outcomes through early mobility and management of delirium in the ICU.

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