HHS PRESS RELEASE

[Jean Kajikawa]

     fyi/jean


______________________________ Forward Header __________________________________
Subject: HHS PRESS RELEASE
Author:  "US Dept of HHS: Press Releases; Other Info"  <HHSPRESS at LIST.NIH.GOV> 
at INTERNET
Date:    2/23/98 3:19 PM


Date:  February 23, 1998
For Release:  Immediately
Contact: Damon Thompson  (202) 205-1842
     
     
Headline:  BETTS NAMED ADVISOR ON NURSING
     
     
     Virginia Trotter Betts of Nashville, Tenn., has been named to
the post of senior advisor to the assistant secretary for health and 
senior advisor on Nursing Policy, HHS Secretary Donna E. Shalala 
announced today.  Betts who served from 1992 to 1996 as president of 
the American Nursing Association, will advise the assistant 
secretary for health and the secretary on a variety of health policy 
concerns, including matters affecting the nursing community.
     
     "I am pleased that Ginna has agreed to be a voice within HHS
for the nation's 2.5 million nurses and the patients they serve," 
Shalala said.  "Her appointment and inclusion in health policy 
development at the highest level of this administration indicates 
the importance we place on nursing and nurses in solving both 
today's and tomorrow's health care problems."
     
     Since 1991, Betts has been a research associate professor and
senior research associate at Vanderbilt University's Institute for 
Public Policy Studies.  She is trained as both a nurse and lawyer, 
receiving her nursing degree cum laude from the University of 
Tennessee's College of Nursing in Memphis in 1969, a master's degree 
in Psychiatric-Mental Health Nursing from Vanderbilt University 
School of Nursing, and a law degree from Nashville School of Law in 
1978.
     
     Betts served as a United States delegate to the World Health
Assembly in 1993 and 1996.
     
     Last year, she was elected as a fellow with the American
Academy of Nursing.  Other honors include her being named the Nursing 
Organization of the Veterans Administration's "Professional Nurse of 
the Year" in 1997, the American Psychiatric Nursing Associations' 
"Nurse of the Year" in October 1996, and a Robert Wood Johnson Health 
Policy Fellow with a year of Senate experience.
     
     Betts will be involved with key federal policy issues that
affect nursing and other areas of health policy -- including 
education, research, developing practice arrangements, 
reimbursement, and future workforce planning to meet the changing 
demographic needs of health care consumers.
     
                                 ###
     
Note:  HHS press releases are available on the World Wide Web at: 
http://www.hhs.gov.