Feature Article October 9, 2002
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New Nurse Practitioner at Sharbot Lake Medical Centreby David Brison Lynn Jechel, who lives in Perth, took her final nurse practitioner exams last week and will start work this week in Sharbot Lake.
On the same day that Lynn was taking her exams, Premier Ernie Eves announced that the provincial government is investing $11 million to fund 117 nurse practitioners for this year and by 2002/05 there will be up to 369 nurse practitioners at work in Ontarios small rural and under serviced communities.
The expansion of nurse practitioner positions was due in part to the work of Mary Woodman and Bonnie Sparrow who not only developed the role in the Verona, Sydenham, and Sharbot Lake clinics but also were members of the Nurse Practitioner Advisory committee that made recommendations to the government.
Lynn Jechel could have been one of about 280 unemployed nurse practitioners in the province had she not had the opportunity to replace Mary Woodman at Sharbot Lake in one of the demonstration projects in the new family network projects. The new funding will create more jobs but there will still be many unemployed nurse practitioners for several more years.
Lynn graduated from Queens in 1982 with a bachelor of science nursing degree. She wrote an undergraduate paper on nurse practitioners. However, when she graduated there were no longer any programs for nurse practitioners in the province. She was interested then in more advance clinical practice but had to wait another 20 years before enrolling in the Queens program.
In the intervening time, she gained a broad background in nursing: five years in general surgery/critical care at KGH in Kingston, and several stints in coronary care at Queensway Carleton in Ottawa and the hospital in Perth. She also worked in her husbands (Dr. Peter Jechel) family practice office in Perth.
I dont have any special initials after my name to indicate it but I do consider coronary care to be an area of interest. I think I will be of help at Sharbot Lake when someone comes in with a chest pain, Lynn says.
Lynn also did a two-month residency at the Perth hospital in the emergency department under Dr. Caroline Ehrat. This experience should come in handy at Sharbot Lake particularly when she is alone at the Saturday and weekday clinics.
Mary Woodman and Bonnie Sparrow both have extensive experience in pre-natal and natal care and have developed specialities in those areas in their clinics. Lynn has less experience in these fields and expects that she will have to share this work with the doctors in Sharbot Lake. I realize that female nurse practitioners in clinics with male doctors often have to do more on the female heath problems and expect that will be the case here. In the preventative area, she will run diabetes clinics, flu clinics, and conduct the breast-screening program. She has a special interest in asthma education.
Lynn loves to sing I remember her as Josephine in a memorable performance of HMS Pinafore and she has been in a number of other Perth Community Choir performances. She loves Broadway musicals and has always wanted to play Anna in The King and I. She would have liked to have the opportunity that Inie Platenius had to do just that in the North Frontenac Little Theatre production. She currently sings with seven women in a group called Thorny Issues .
