By Lois Thomson
Sonia Brown, DNP, RN, MSN, currently Assistant Professor – College of Nursing, West Palm Beach Campus of South University, started her career as an acute care Medical Surgical nurse. However, it was what happened after patients left the hospital and went home that really attracted her attention. “I became intrigued with the fact that we had a lot of recurring patient admissions – the same patient would go home and come back in a week or two. It piqued my interest, because I wanted to see what happened when they left the hospital.”
This interest resulted in Dr. Brown’s introduction to home care. She explained that she became fascinated with it because it gave her the opportunity to see patients in their home environment, which she called their safe space. In a hospital setting there’s anxiety, and the patients’ greatest desire is to be discharged. However, Dr. Brown said that at home, “You’re seeing them in a different environment. Not only was I able to do the clinical things I was supposed to do for them in the home, but I was also able to do more teaching because they were more relaxed in their safe space.” She added that it also gave her the opportunity to see what their home environment was like, because that often contributes to their health and well being, both physically and mentally.
She pointed out that home health combines education with teaching, for as much as you inform the patient, you must also inform the family – the patient’s support system – because they are the drivers who manage medications, oversee dietary management, etc., and that plays a large part in keeping the patient from returning to the hospital. “That was fascinating to me and I became hooked on home care.”
The combination of working in home care and realizing how much education is involved prompted Dr. Brown to switch her career into academia. Because education is such a large component of home care, she said, “I wanted to see if I could make a difference in terms of the academic preparation of nursing, that does not focus 100 percent on the clinical self, but on the empathy that goes into it as well.”
In progressing through her career, Dr. Brown earned a Bachelors Degree from Long Island University; and a Master of Science in Nursing Education, a Post-Masters in Nursing Leadership and Management, and a Doctorate of Nursing Practice – all from Walden University. She began her career in New York, but relocated to South Florida in 2001, saying, “My mother was in Florida and I’m an only child, and with an aging parent I was looking ahead.” She added with a chuckle, “There was also the weather.”
Dr. Brown found that South University was a good fit. “It affords me the opportunity to tap into my experience, to utilize the different academic credits I have, because there’s a little bit of every component right now in my faculty role. What I like about being here in this culture is that it aligns with my overall philosophy. One of the pillars of South University is that the holism of the patient is important and I am very much a proponent of that; not only do we promote academic excellence, but we also have an environment that addresses the holism of the individual. We’re talking about the sensitivity that relates to cultural, social, economic diversity that we have in our patient population.”
Despite her current focus on academia, Dr. Brown keeps her hand in the clinical side of the work. She has gone into acute care settings with groups of students, and also oversees simulation exercises. “We create a clinical environment that is a safe space, so before students get into the clinical setting where they are practicing with live patients, we create a hospital environment where they are exposed to all that they would see at a bedside.”
Specifically, for example, Dr. Brown mentioned the clinic is fortunate to have high fidelity mannequins that closely mimic the hospital environment, so students are able to practice in a controlled environment before they go into live experience.
“That’s what helps keep me in academia – it’s not just about teaching a nurse how to give medications or teaching them how to do wound care, but also to assess – who is that patient you’re performing these skills on and what makes them who they are.”
For more information, call (561) 273-6500, or visit www.southuniversity.edu/west-palm-beach.
