xt7f1v5bdm5v https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7f1v5bdm5v/data/mets.xml The Frontier Nursing Service, Inc. 1985 bulletins  English The Frontier Nursing Service, Inc. Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Frontier Nursing Service Quarterly Bulletins Frontier Nursing Service Quarterly Bulletin, Vol. 60, No. 3, Winter 1985 text Frontier Nursing Service Quarterly Bulletin, Vol. 60, No. 3, Winter 1985 1985 2014 true xt7f1v5bdm5v section xt7f1v5bdm5v vA\Jl51~
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CONTENTS tg   V __ ·¢.A
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Wooton — a Clinic Twice Reborn 1   2
Beyond the Mountains 9  
by Kate Ireland  
Frontier School Welcomes 96th Class 11  H ’ j_,·
When Snow Comes to the Mountains · 12 »  ,. 3 ·
Photo Page 17 _ .
An Adventure in Midwifery — The Nurse-on-Horseback 18 ` "
Gets a "Soon Start"  
by Mary Breckinridge 5 Q
Nurse Practitioner Issue Planned 26 gg 
Service Awards Presented to FNS Employees at 27  
Christmas Dinner W 
In Memoriam 28 I * 
Memorial Gifts 29 l _
Notes from the School 31 ii ‘  »  
Courier News 32   fs  V
Field Notes 33 A   A
News of Former Staff 35  
In Brief 35  
Alumni News 36 ,
Urgent Needs Inside Back Cover i
Front Cover: When the snow vanished into the streams, Hyden took on that "late winter I
look" that promised bluer skies,warmer days, and the budding of tree and bush. Here the
camera looks out over the 123 steps that descend from the Frontier School to joy House (at
the left), from which point a winding road takes the hiker down a further steep descent to 1
the Mary Breckinridge Hospital, barely visible at the lower right, at the foot of Hospital Hill.  
The buildings of downtown Hyden can be seen in the distance. l
Comments and questions regarding the editorial content of the FNS Quarterly l
Bulletin may be addressed to its Managing Editor, Robert Beeman, at the _,,
Frontier Nursing Service, Hyden, Kentucky 41749. A
  ,. .._ (Y'-
riaonriicn NURSING siaxvics ouA12rst<1.Y BUl,I,l·]'l`IN J}
us ISSN0016-211ti · I
Published ut the end of earch quarter by the Frontier Nursing Service, Inc.
Wendovcr, Kentucky 11775
Subscription Price $5,00 u Ycur
Edit0r's Office, Wcndover, Kentucky 41775
vo1.uMr~: so WINTER, was NUMBER a I
Second-class postage paid at Wendover, Ky. ·1l775 and at additional mailing offices V
Send Form 3579 to Frontier Nursing Service, Wendover, Ky. 41775 `
Copyright 1985, Frontier Nursing Service, Inc.
l
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j ` WOOTON - A CLINIC TWICE REBORN
There has always been a "romantic" side to the Frontier Nursing  
Service. Countless stories out of its sixty-year past tell of rescues *
—of aid brought through blizzards to women in labor, of wounded
  men carried over rough trails on improvised stretchers to the
  hospital, of nurses fording rivers to remote cabins to care for
Pi children with a dangerous fever.
fg To those actually involved, little of this was very romantic. It
  entailed difficulty and danger, anxiety and sacrifice. It was hard _
  work often at inconvenient times. But it had as its reward the  
! i
l * satisfaction of having given care when care was urgently needed. l
e J . . .
j i A few years ago, FNS became involved in a rescue operation of a
l l different kind — it rescued a clinic. The rescue itself was not
{ A especially dramatic. Participants came, not on horses, but on foot
  and in cars and jeeps. They drove on paved roads and did not have
E l to swim any flooded rivers. They carried no medicines or medical
§ , equipment. What they did may not sound like high adventure, but
  2

 2 FRONTIER NURSING SERVICE c
in the end they saved for the community of Wooton a clinic that
would otherwise have been abandoned.
Wooton is a small community that can be reached by following
Kentucky State Route 80 northeast about eight miles from Hyden.
The road continues on to Hazard, another ten or twelve miles F,
beyond, and in the early days, Wooton residents were more likely to Qi
look to Hazard for support than to Hyden. FNS itself always is
thought of Wooton as lying within its area of service. It made home  
visits in this northeastern part of Leslie County for many years, but .
FNS never built a clinic there. It is not clear why. Possibly the `.
reason was that Wooton seemed to be "on the other side of the  
mountain." Psychologically, the intervening mountain was indeed l
a barrier, and even today, Route 80, with its sharp turns and grades, _
is not easy to drive in bad weather.
A more likely reason is that Mary Breckinridge may have felt
that Wooton already had adequate health care. A small clinic had A
been established there early in the century, in a small log cabin.
One resident recalled that the clinic, in addition to providing its _
other kinds of care, got very much involved with tonsils. His
impression was that the clinic was too small to provide recovery 1
rooms for tonsillectomy patients, and on days when operations _'
were performed, patients often rested outside on pallets for a few p
hours before they were sent home. In any case, Wooton was not ,
without health care when Mary Breckinridge established the  
Frontier Nursing Service in 1925.  
Wooton is one of those Appalachian communities in which a
church has been a prime mover in bringing in education, health l
care, and other services from "the outside." In Wooton’s case, the
Presbyterian Church was an important force. Over a period of
years, the church built a school, a hospital and clinic, and, of course s‘*
a church building. The Rev. William Buyers came to Hyden in 1912
and very soon began preaching in Wooton as well. Services were _
held in the schoolhouse. The church also had a demonstration farm, ·`
where it taught basic skills, including weaving and woodwork, that
enabled the community to set up various cottage industries. For a ‘
number of years, the church was active in a number of "social type" i
ministries. tg
The Presbyterian Church built its hospital at Wooton within a  
few years after FNS opened the Hyden Hospital in 1928. Helen {
g.
 

 QUARTERLY BULLETIN zi  
Green, a member of the FNS Wooton Clinic’s Advisory Committee, I
remembers that she was the hospital’s first surgical patient. She  
p says that Dr. Collins removed her appendix in an operation L
performed, as she recalls, somewhere around 1930. But the hospital  
closed just a few years later. By then, there were improved facilities Q
in Leslie County, not only at FNS in Hyden, but also in Hazard and F
* Harlan. Hyden and Hazard could be reached by Route 80, which —
* was a new road that had not yet been paved and hardly provided for 1
i easy travel. Helen Green recalls that "you still had to go into the  
7 creek from time to time" — and she says she still has a vivid l
` memory of the smell of the tar that covered its surface. Harlan, i
[ farther away to the south, could be reached by a narrow road.
Despite some difficulty in getting to these facilities, their presence
_ convinced those in charge that there was no longer a sufficient need
for a hospital at Wooton. In any case, with the closing of the
hospital, no comparable health services were to be available in
Wooton for about thirty-five years.
Interesting accounts of these earlier days have been set down in
books written by some of the participants. Mary T. Brewer’s
i I `  lll Q
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= Photo by Gabrielle Beasley
E Dr. lean Sullivan chats with a Wooton patient

 l
4 FRONTIER NURSING SERVICE  
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Three members of the Wooton C|inic’s Advisory Committee get together informally ?
at the clinic: Chairman Mary Alice Murray, Walter Green, and Helen Green
Rugged Trail to Appalachia and Nola Pease VanderMeer’s The  
Tired Country Smiles are full of interesting history. Beyond a few  
works of this kind, there is little in the way of official records, and it l
can be difficult to pin down exact dates and happenings. There is  
one interesting footnote: If Nola Pease VanderMeer’s name seems E
familiar to people who have never been in this part ofthe country, it  
is probably because her husband’s nephew, Johnny VanderMeer, l
made a unique place for himself in the baseball record books by V
pitching two consecutive no-hit games for the Brooklyn Dodgers
some years back.
Eventually, the Mountain Comprehensive Health Corporation
(MCHC), an agency supported by federal funds through the Office
of Equal Opportunity, built a new clinic at Wooton. The clinic ll
building was made up of two trailers, set side by side twelve feet
apart, with one roof covering the trailers and the intervening space. ,,
The trailers contained examining rooms, offices, and other facilities.
The center area provided a waiting room and reception desk. A
third, somewhat smaller, trailer, was added, at right angles, at the
back of the building. This subsequently housed a dental clinic. A  
former employee of MCHC believes that these trailers had been Q
brought in from Pennsylvania, where they had been used as X,
temporary shelter during flood rescue operations.  

 ¤
  QUARTERLY BULLETIN 5
i The MCHC clinic had a large staff, including a doctor, a dentist,  
  two nurse practitioners, nurse aides, a clinic manager, financial {
; advisors, and a van driver who brought patients in from outlying
{ areas in one of several large four-wheel-drive vehicles. MCHC
l subcontracted with the Frontier Nursing Service for part of the
nursing staff. Susan Hull, now Project Director of FNS’ Community
Health Clinic at Big Creek, worked at the Wooton clinic for about a
* year, moving on in the summer of 1976. Judy Floyd, a nurse who
gi had graduated from the Frontier School of Midwifery and Family
(V Nursing, also worked at Wooton during this time. Sue Hull recalls
‘ A that the clinic saw from ten to twenty patients a day.  
. Toward the end of 1977, MCHC decided to close the clinic at  
  Wooton. This time, the community, having already lost one `
E previous clinic and a hospital, strongly objected to losing another. _
i Lois Baker, who was directing the Wooton operation, called a public
i meeting at nearby W.B. Muncy Elementary School to explain that
MCHC was closing the clinic because of budgetary problems, and to
consider the possibility that the Frontier Nursing Service could
V take it over.
i FNS Director W.B. Rogers Beasley, Assistant Director Evelyn l
l Peck, and other FNS representatives attended. They understood
l the importance of "rescuing" the clinic and agreed to do so if the
E community would provide the necessary support, which, in the FNS
T view, required the establishment of an active Advisory Committee
I made up of responsible local citizens. FNS had no trouble getting
such a committee together.
Like the advisory committees that assist the other FNS district
clinics, the Wooton committee is composed of dedicated members of
the community. Mary Alice Murray, its present chairman, came to l
Wooton in 1966 to work in Christian education. Walter Green, who, ;
`° with his wife, Helen, has been a member from the beginning, l
worked in forestry for the State of Kentucky; at one time, he was .
_, involved in putting in some of the first telephone lines in the area. 1
Altogether, the committee averages about eight active members,
who meet quarterly.
The Advisory Committee functions as a link between FNS and
g the community, and it also has been active in raising funds for the
I clinic. It has bought a copying machine, an otoscope, a doppler
i fetoscope, baby scales, and other medical equipment. It has also
E` bought a washing machine and dryer, installed acoustical insula-

 6 FRONTIER NURSING SERVICE V
tion in the project director’s office, and built the railing around the
front porch. Although FNS provides basic maintenance for the YV
clinic, the Advisory Committee people often help with smaller 6
repairs. Also, it carried out one of Mary Alice Murray’s pet projects,
which was to replace the formal examining robes with longer and _
more attractively colored robes. These are color-coded by size, and, l
in the children’s sizes, are cheerfully decorated. Each year, the $·
committee sponsors Christmas parties and buys gifts for the ix
children.  
The committee has spent close to $7,000 on projects of these if
kinds. The money has been raised by means of spaghetti suppers, ,
yard sales, auctions, country music shows, and by providing food
for voters on Election Day.
Once FNS knew that it had the support of the community, it E
proceeded to organize and staff the clinic in the light of its
experience with the other district clinics. It knew that it could not 1
afford the large staff that MCHC had used, and so it organized a ,7
smaller staff around Sharon Koser as Project Director. Sharon, a
native of Seattle, had come to FNS in 1969. She had obtained her j
BSN from the School of Nursing of the University of Washington in
1965 and had worked two years in Salem, Oregon and in Chicago. ,
When she first came to FNS, she worked at the Wendover clinic, j
making many home visits in the Wendover/Muncy’s Creek part of ;
Leslie County. Altogether, she was the Wendover district nurse for
seven years. During this time, she also completed the family nurse 3
practitioner program at the Frontier School of Midwifery and
Family Nursing, graduating in January 1976. After the Wendover  
clinic was closed, in 1976, Sharon worked at the Beech Fork clinic,  
leaving in December 1977 to go to Wooton, where she has been
project director ever since. At Christmastime this winter, Sharon ‘<
received a certificate recognizing her fifteen years of service to FNS.
The Wooton clinic has been basically a one-nurse operation, (
although it has had a second nurse at times. Its current staff  
consists of Sharon, Charlene Wells (a nurse aide), and Liza Evans I
(receptionist). Sharon has mentioned, with evident pleasure, that ?
she personally knows five generations of Charlene Wells’ family  
and has cared for four of them.  
Although the staff that FNS sent to Wooton was considerably  ·
smaller than the one maintained previously, the Wooton clinic soon  L

 I QUARTERLY BULLETIN 7 \
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. Photo by Gabrielle Beasley
’ Sharon Koser, Project Director of the Wooton Clinic, with a young patient and mother
  began to see ten patients a day, and on the days when a doctor went
to the clinic, there often were as many as 30 patients.
. The first doctor at Wooton after FNS took over the clinic was Dr.
. Anne Wasson, who is fondly remembered there, as she is throughout  
j FNS and the many FNS communities to which she has given l
Vi herself. Currently, Wooton is served by Dr. Jean Sullivan, who 3
  came to FNS last year from Arizona. Dr. Sullivan visits Wooton two i
days each week. The staff is assisted also by students from the ,
`( Frontier School of Midwifery and Family Nursing, who get a i
certain amount of their "hands on" education through work at the
{ district clinics.
  One facility that came to FNS along with the clinic was the
dental clinic. This was reopened on November 11, 1979 with a new
dentist, Dr. Gregory P. Lynne, who, in the period just before starting
A his work at Wooton, conducted dental screening examinations in
‘ the elementary schools of Leslie County. However, FNS ultimately
 V. decided that the dental clinic needed a more central location, and it
 _; was moved to Hyden in 1982.
 L
Jl

 8 FRONTIER NURSING SERVICE p
Like the other FNS district clinics, the Wooton Clinic becomes
involved in substantial "extracurricular" activity. About four times
a year, it sets up a free blood pressure clinic at the post office. It has
held classes in diet for the community, and recently it has received a
number of requests for "stop smoking" classes. The clinic building
is only a few hundred yards from the Muncy Elementary School, y
and it has assisted the school when called on to help with medical i'
problems. Sharon Koser feels that the clinic benefits from its ;g
proximity to the school, since contacts with students and staff éi
extend the clinic’s contacts with the community. However, she 3
says, the community is very active. It schedules so many activities I
that the clinic sometimes has difficulty finding a non-competitive
hour for programs of its own that would benefit from community
participation.
Wooton’s patients come, for the most part, from within a radius '
of three or four miles, although some patients come greater
distances — from Avawam and Cutshin, and other communities .
ten or more miles away.
Wooton’s history has been different from th at of the other clinics
in one respect: It has never had a home visit program as such. The
MCHC clinic had no license to engage in home health services, and S
it seems to have been content to leave home care to FNS, which ?
provided it from its original base at Wendover. As a result, the r
community does not expect home visits from the clinic staff. Sharon I
Koser, however, feels that something is lost when nurses cannot
visit patients in their homes. (This view is often expressed by the
nurses at the other district clinics.) It is easier to understand and _
prescribe for a patient’s health problems when the health provider  
knows something of the environment. It is still important, in this 2
mountainous area, to understand whether a patient must carry i
groceries and supplies across a swinging bridge or up a steep slope, e
and whether they must depend on other people for transportation. L
Sharon commented on Mary Breckinridge’s view'that if health  I
care begins with a baby — or with prenatal care — it is likely to  Y
extend to the whole family. This has proved to be the case, although  ‘
Sharon points out that the clinic has less contact with men from the ,
time they leave school until they become senior citizens. It remains " 
difficult for working men to get time from their jobs to take care of F
preventive health concerns. Employers do allow them sick leave for  i_
I

 _ QUARTERLY BULLETIN 9 Q
, dealing with serious health problems, but the importance of health  
maintenance as such is still not widely appreciated. For the rest of {
the family, however, the Wooton clinic, like the other FNS district H
clinics, still can offer the continuity of care that the community feels 1
  is so important.
In its first years, the FNS pattern was to look for a community
  that needed a district clinic, and to build one there. Over the years,
some of these clinics have moved, have been combined with others,
  or have been discontinued, mainly for reasons having to do with
  changes in the environment and the need. In recent years, a
  different pattern has appeared. At Pine Mountain, FNS revived a (
clinic that had closed years before. At Yerkes, it took over a clinic
that had been closed about a year. At Wooton, it saved an existing
clinic from closing. Even in a day of better roads and faster »
communication, the district clinics still serve a much—appreciated
l need. The role that FNS assumes today when it needs to move into a
new community may be somewhat different from the role FNS grew
— up playing, but it serves the same objective of bringing care to those
who need it.  
E BEYOND THE MOUNTAINS
by Kate Ireland
_ The total commitment of volunteer workers is essential in any
I maj or capital fund-raising campaign, and our "Nursing Education
Enrichment Drive" has been advanced enormously through the
efforts of loyal friends of Frontier Nursing Service.
. Special meetings and fund-raising events have been sponsored
  in many of our committee areas during the three-year campaign, ?
. with the most recent occurring on December 12 at the Idle Hour  
“ Country Club in Lexington, courtesy of the First Security National (
Bank and Trust Company.
, Helen Mayes, Trustee, and Barbara and Will Rouse helped me
` gather some Bluegrass leaders to reach FNS friends for the NEED
 . Campaign in the Lexington area. Bluegrass Committee co—chairman
 · Betty Kenan (Courier, 1965), Jim Kenan (Board of Governors), Joan
 c Gaines, and Ruth Roach, who both have joined us on recent "Open
·` House" tours, along with Dr. and Mrs. John P. Stewart, helped us
  hold a most successful evening of fun and fund-raising. You’ll be
i` hearing more about NEED soon. ~

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The Frontier Sch00I’s 96th class, with its instructors *
Sr. Nathalie Elder" Susan Banks Nancy Fishwick*
Susan Skinner Wendy Wagers* 1
Melanie Gillis Sr. Kathryn O’Meara*
Barbara Buickus Ann Condie
Brigid Robinson Donna Heller .
Mary Semer Anita Wiggam
*Faculty

 I I
7 I
_ QUARTERLY BULLETIN 11  
_ I
, FRONTIER SCHOOL WELCOMES 96th CLASS  
' The Frontier School of Midwifery and Family Nursing welcomed its 96th I
class during the first week of the year. This year’s class is the first to enter I
under the new requirement that entrants must have at least a Bachelor of I
Science degree in Nursing. FSMFN has always chosen highly qualified I
nurses, but the formal degree has not been insisted upon in every case, since  
  the school has always required that applicants be registered nurses with 1
  very substantial professional experience. The new requirement has been
I established to conform to the position ofthe American Nurses’ Association
F that candidates wishing to sit for the certification examination as a family
pi, nurse practitioner after June 1985 must have at least a BSN degree. I
  The nine new students have had an average of nearly seven years of  
working experience. As usual, there are several who have worked overseas. I
The FSMFN curriculum offers a twelve-month program to prepare
nurses for certification as nurse practitioners. It also offers a sixteen-month
program to prepare nurses for certification as family nurse-midwives. Most
` FSMFN students elect the family nurse-midwifery option.
The new class members are:
Susan Banks, Lubbock, Texas; B.A. (Political Science), Texas Technical
University, Lubbock, Texas (1975); BSN, University of Texas Health Science Center,
. San Antonio, Texas (1981). I
Barbara Buickus, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania; BSN, Misericordia College,
' Dallas, Pennsylvania (1973).
Ann Condie, Saratoga, California; AA (General Education, Science), West
` Valley College, Saratoga, California (1977); BSN, Biola University, La Mirada,
, California (1980).
Melanie Gillis, Rochester, Minnesota; AAN, Rochester Community College,
. Rochester, Minnesota (1979); BSN, Winona State University, Rochester, Minnesota I
(1984). I
Donna Heller, Brattleboro, Vermont; BSN, University of Wisconsin, Madison,  
Wisconsin (1976); served as an RN with the Peace Corps for two years in Malawi, 1
I Central Africa (1979-1981). I
*9 Brigid Robinson, Laramie, Wyoming; BSN, University of Wyoming, Laramie,  
Wyoming (1979); has worked in San Jose, Costa Rica both as an elementary teacher
(1970-1972) and as a community nurse (1983-1984); also worked as an archaeological
I field assistant on Easter Ireland, Chile, for four months in 1979.
Mary Semer, East Lansing, Michigan; diploma, Providence Hospital School of
I Nursing, Southfield, Michigan (1973); BSN, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor,
. Michigan (1976).
 » Susan Skinner, Astoria, Oregon; BSN, University of Texas, Houston, Texas
· (1976).
  Anita Wiggam, Indianapolis, Indiana; BSN, University of Evansville, Evans-
I ville, Indiana (1979).

 I IT`;
I ` ’I
I I
I g I. I
12 FRONTIER NURSING SERVICE   A
I
WHEN SNOW COMES TO THE MOUNTAINS  
The blizzard that assaulted Appalachia in mid-February dropped  
nearly two feet of snow on the area served by the Frontier Nursing I e I
Service. No precise measurements are known to us, but most I `°‘
communities in Leslie and Perry Counties were sure they had , LL;
received from 18 to 24 inches. At Hyden and Wendover the depth of ; I `
the covering was probably about 21 inches. it
Those who come from the northern parts of this country may see I
such a snowfall mainly as an inconvenience, severe perhaps, but  
only temporary. Northerners expect snow, and they are prepared  
for it. Their cities and towns are well equipped with plows, snow I
throwers, salt, and sand. Snow crews go to work promptly as the I
snow deepens and can usually keep the important roads open, or  
make them at least passable within a few hours. I _
But in the middle latitudes of the United States, even a light    
snow can cripple a wide area. A city like Lexington, for example,   I  
which is 125 miles northwest of Hyden, expects no more than a few  
inches of snow at a time, and there are few times when the snow I
does not melt and run off in a day or two. Thus, Lexington can I  
hardly justify a large investment in snow removal forces. Even so, ¤
it must sometimes endure a brief period of paralysis after even a  
light fall, because it cannot cope effectively with snow and ice. V
Typically, at one major shopping mall, many cars simply could not
climb a relatively shallow grade to one of the exits. The snow had
melted slightly during the day and frozen again at night, and no
one had been able to get to it with a load of salt or sand.
Considering the confusion and hazardous conditions in a city I
like Lexington, one may imagine what the snow did to the I
mountainous area where the Frontier Nursing Service is located.
These mountains are not high, but they are steep and closely set. ’I
Even the main roads (the Daniel Boone Parkway is an exception)  
have sharp turns, and many have grades that, while short, may be  
quite steep for brief stretches. Ice or packed snow on a slope only Il
twenty feet long can effectively make a road impassable. Many  
roads lack guard rails, and there are numerous points where a skid  
over the edge would launch a vehicle on a precipitous tumble. I
Moreover, quite a few back roads are not paved at all.  
While newcomers are often surprised that mountain schools I
may close for a week after a light snowfall, anyone who has seen E

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