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The NP Shout Out Award contest collected submissions from nurse practitioners who worked toward greater recognition of the profession in a variety of ways, from radio shows to public billboards to magazine articles. Readers voted, and the results are in: We'd like to give a shout out to Mimi Secor, a family NP who works in women's health at Newton-Wellesley Obstetrics & Gynecology in Newton, Mass. In 2010, Secor became cohost of a national XM Radio show titled "Partners in Practice." Secor's programs are focused on the role of the nurse practitioner in healthcare.
A Longtime Advocate for NPs
Secor says her campaign to get the word out about NPs goes way back. "It has been my career-long mission to increase awareness of the NP role," she says. For two and a half years, she hosted a syndicated radio show titled "Hot Topics in Women's Health."
"I interviewed all my NP friends and experts on women's health," she says, but after that show ended she was looking for something with a national audience. Then Secor was recommended by a colleague as a nurse practitioner cohost for "Partners in Practice." Now she's hosting a show that has global reach by Internet access.
"They're listening everywhere, all the time." Currently 400,000 healthcare professionals subscribe to the ReachMD channel, including 25% of the U.S. physician population; however, no subscription is necessary to listen.
Secor's cohost, Lisa Dandrea Lenell, MPAS, PA-C, whose programs run separately, addresses PA issues. "I've always worked very closely with physician assistants in my career clinically," says Secor. "I see them as very parallel - and we learn from each other, so this is a fantastic opportunity to cohost with a PA who has a year ahead of me - she's done 100 shows and has been a great mentor for me."
Secor says the most valuable aspect of this experience has been her ability to showcase the nurse practitioner profession as well as the expertise of NP colleagues. "I want to make sure we're not the best-kept secret in healthcare." She has interviewed well-known NPs, including Loretta Ford, NP, founder of the NP profession, about topics ranging from the clinical to the academic.
To lead her to this point in her career, Secor has worked hard to become a media maven. She follows the trends in healthcare and talks to the media about topics that are relevant to the public. She's appeared as a healthcare expert on radio, TV, newspapers and magazines - some of her favorites include The Boston Globe, The Wall Street Journal and Cosmopolitan. And "Tom Bergeron, who hosts 'Dancing With the Stars' and 'America's Funniest Home Videos,' had me on his TV show in Boston several times," she says.
Media Mentor
The fun part of the radio show, she says, is helping NPs become comfortable with a media interview. "I think it's a great venue for showcasing nurse practitioners in the profession and giving NPs experience with the media in a real positive, mentoring kind of way." She knows from experience how stressful it can be to talk to the media. "Once I was on hold for three hours to talk on 'The Howard Stern Show,'" she says, and although the interview was cancelled, "waiting was like sitting on the end of a high board."
She works with each of her guests before they record a show. "I'm not going to trip them up - I develop questions that they're comfortable with me asking and go through it as much as we need to before the interview." This helps NPs be prepared for talking about their profession, although she warns her guests that future interviewers may not be so helpful. "I usually tell guests to throw the script away because they're experts and I want it to sound like it flows."
She tells NPs that the best way to hone their interview skills is practice. "What I tell them is that that need to do it, that they need to practice, that they need to be prepared, that they need to be ready for someone to contact them, and they need to know what they want to say." She recommends going as far as writing down three key messages on a card and having them prepared when an interviewer asks a question. "NPs need to be proactive and answer like a politician," she says, by making sure to get across the message they want to portray. "When a politician doesn't like the question, they answer with what they want to say."
Now, NPs come to her when they want to share their story. She aims to interview nurse practitioners who are experts in evidence-based healthcare. "Show me the evidence," she says. "People know we spend more time with patients, that we're amicable, empathetic, into counseling and education, but I think where people miss the point is how smart we are, how educated we are, how much knowledge we bring, and how that's based on research. We're not just shooting from the hip when we treat patients."
Secor will continue to work toward her goal of bringing greater awareness and credibility to the NP profession. "I want listeners to be wowed by my guests' brilliance."
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