Shirley Orr, MHS, ARNP, CNAA President, ASTDN

ASTDN/ACHNE Conference This year ASTDN joins with our academic partners, Association of Community Health Nurse Educators (ACHNE) in a conference to be held May 30-June 3, 2007 in Kansas City, Missouri. We will have the opportunity to discuss emergency preparedness issues, as well as certification status, legislative issues, and the steps to build our ASTDN infrastructure. ASTDN has been awarded several CDC Cooperative Agreements through our affiliate status with ASTHO. This CDC funding provides us with the opportunity to fulfill some of our strategic planning goals. This conference will provide the forum to discuss relevant issues within the setting of a strong peer network. We are well known for mixing in a healthy dose of fun and relaxation. I hope you can join us as we celebrate our achievements and make important decisions to move our organization forward. Karen O’Brien, ASTDN President Nursing Care During Emergency’s and Disasters Public health nurses have historically responded to community disaster response and emergencies and have focused on meeting the needs of vulnerable populations. ASTDN has an opportunity to cosponsor a national conference with the American Nurses Association to discuss and shape the nursing profession’s disaster-response policy. As your President, I was invited in December to meet with an expert working group of RN’s, other health care professionals, government representatives and disaster planning strategists to create a comprehensive document that can help guide and protect RNs working under extreme conditions. The ANA conference, “Policy by the People: Nursing Care in Life, Death, and Disaster” will be held June 20-22, 2007 in Atlanta, Georgia. ASTDN, as a co-sponsor, will be able to send 3 representatives plus the President to participate. The ASTDN Emergency Preparedness Committee has submitted an abstract and requested display space for our organization. Overall conference goals include examining how current nursing standards of care might be altered during a disaster to save as many lives as possible, describing institutional and individual actions that can reduce risks to patients when care must be altered for emergency purposes and directing individual RNs to sources for planning emergency and disaster response preparedness.