The Complementary Spouse has never been one to toot her own horn. She much prefers to stay in the background and let her work speak for itself. So it falls to me to toot the horn for her.
Barb started out as a registered nurse in 1977 after graduating with her BSN from the Medical College of Virginia. She was part of a nursing fellowship program at MCV Hospital where new RNs would rotate through 2-3 departments. After a peds rotation, she moved to the burn center where she treated both children and adults who had been burned severely. She stayed there for five years.
Fast forward to the mid-1980s where she took a job in the PACU at Memorial Mission Hospital in Asheville. During the intervening years, she had worked in home health and hospice as well as with an infusion therapy company where she treated some of the early AIDS patients. During her 25 years with Mission, she earned both her certification as a Certified Perianethesia Nurse (CPAN) and her Masters in Health Sciences. At Mission, she worked both the in-patient and out-patient PACU, provided clinical support for surgical services, and finally was a Nurse Education Specialist for Patient Education where she coordinated patient education hospital-wide.
She was named a Great 100 in 1996 for her commitment to nursing excellence. It is an award given annually to the top nurses in the state of North Carolina. One must be nominated by your peers for the honor and it can only be won once.
After leaving Mission during cutbacks in 2013, she moved to UNC Health – Pardee which she now works doing pre-anesthesia screening. She was their first and only Anesthesia Navigator.
Barb has always been active with the North Carolina Association of Perianesthia Nurses and helped found the local chapter in the mountains. Even this morning, she got up before 6am to head to their state conference being held in Asheville to help work the registration table. It was going to be a busy day with many speakers plus awards for both 2020 and 2021.
What she didn’t know when she left for the state conference this morning is that she was going to get a major award. I did know and have kept it secret for almost two months. Thanks to the president of NCAPAN, I was able to sneak in the back the room as they were reading out the history of her career and her service to both the state and local chapters. I watched as her hand flew to her face as the realization dawned on Barb that the president was speaking about her.
So congratulations are in order for Barbara Richardson aka The Complementary Spouse for being the NCAPAN Nurse of the Year for 2020.
As she retires in early December, it is a fitting way to bring a long career to a close.
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