Champions of Health Care
In our third annual edition of Champions of Health Care, Edge magazine received nearly 200 recommendations from the public about health care providers, administrators and volunteers who are making health care better in Chattanooga.From among those nominations, a panel of judges comprised of top leaders from the Chattanooga/Hamilton County Medical Society and each of Chattanooga's three major hospital systems - Erlanger Health System, CHI Memorial Hospital and Parkridge Health System - picked nine winners in eight different classifications of health care.The Champions of Health Care award winners this year have tackled major community health problems, started or promoted programs to better coordinate care and expanded initiatives for wellness and disease detection. Others are recognized for new approaches, strong leadership and simple acts of kindness during their lifetimes of achievement and service. In a variety of volunteer and professional roles across many of Chattanooga's major health care institutions, the honorees have distinguished themselves and the community for improving the health of individuals and Chattanooga as a whole.This year's Champions of Health Care will be honored at an awards luncheon at The Chattanoogan on Wednesday, September 5.
After working 20-plus years at some of the most impoverished health clinics in the city, Family Nurse Practitioner Judy Buhrman has witnessed things no one wants to see. But she has also seen selfless love, undying gratitude and immeasurable sacrifice.
She recalls a woman in her exam room cradling her newborn grandson, who cried inconsolably as his little body detoxed from numerous substances he was exposed to in-utero.
Non-physican Practitioner Award
Honors a health care provider other than a doctor whose performance is considered exemplary by patients and peersAccomplishments: A nurse and family nurse practitioner for the past 28 years, Buhrman has helped provide care to thousands of impoverished persons at community clinics on the Westside and in Hixson for CHI Memorial.
"I will never forget the pride she felt for that child and the love in her eyes – she only saw the good," she recalls. "It was truly giving from nothing. It was beautiful to see, and I get to see that every day. That's the beauty of working here."
Buhrman's nursing career began in 1990 - 25 years after graduating from Duke University with a degree in chemistry. Her first job was working as an organic chemist in North Carolina's Research Triangle Institute, helping put her husband, Richard, through law school.
Richard then went on to serve three years as a Captain in the Army during the Vietnam War. While at Fort Knox, Judy worked for the Army Medical Research Laboratory, working on efforts to increase the length of time whole blood donated in the States could be used when shipped to Vietnam. After the Army, the couple returned to their Chattanooga roots (they met at City High School). While Richard started his law career, Judy left the professional world to raise their three children, Tom, Audrey and John.
Her dreams of medical school were put on hold indefinitely. But when her kids became teenagers she went back to school, graduating from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga in 1990 with her nursing degree. Her first job was at Memorial Hospital in the surgical intensive care unit, where she earned numerous certifications including Critical Care Registered Nurse. She describes her decision to pursue her master's degree as almost by chance.
"A friend was doing it and asked if I'd like to go back with her," she recalls. "Memorial is very good about education and I availed myself of every opportunity."
She headed back to UTC's campus, this time graduating as a Family Nurse Practitioner in 1997. Buhrman's heart for the less fortunate has been a constant theme in her career. In nursing school, when asked to write a paper on a disease she chose poverty.
"The professor was a little miffed," she says. "But I truly believe it's a disease. It affects everything."
If it were a clinically accepted diagnosis, then Buhrman would be a specialist. Her first job as a Nurse Practitioner was at Erlanger's Alton Park Community Health Center. A few years later she learned CHI Memorial was opening the Westside Health Clinic in the former James A. Henry Elementary School building on Grove Street.
It had four exam rooms, a miniscule lab and infestations of all sorts of things that crawl and fly. The 100-year-old building had cleaning, plumbing and heating issues and dust that flared allergies for patients and staff. She leapt at the chance to work there.
"I'll never forget the first day I worried we didn't have any patients – no one knew we were there yet," she recalls. "My office manager Karen said, 'You want patients? I'll get you patients.' She went into the street and came back with six people."
Last August, the Westside clinic closed its doors, consolidating with Memorial's other community health facility in Hixson. The move was bittersweet. On one hand the new facility has 14 exam rooms, six nurse practitioners, a full-time social worker, a lab and on-site x-ray, serving almost 10,000 patients each year. But the new location means some of her Westside patients now have to travel an hour by bus for their medical care.
"We're still serving the same population, but for some the travel is tough," she says. "Even so they're happy to be here and grateful for the care. And I'm grateful that Memorial put this clinic here and subsidizes it."
Designated as a charity clinic, roughly half of the clinic's patients are uninsured. The remaining are either on TennCare or Medicare. In addition to money set aside by the Memorial Health Partners Foundation, the clinic operates on grants to help with hardships beyond the exam room. Many patients can't afford their medications; some don't even have a refrigerator for storing insulin even if they could buy it.
The clinic staff does everything they can to help, including bus passes and pharmacy assistance. When at the Westside they kept a "kitchen" for patients, stocking peanut butter and canned goods with their own money. The clinic recently received a $2,500 grant from the St. Mary's Legacy Foundation, which was matched by Memorial. The funds helped purchase diabetic testing kits such as glucometer strips and lances. Richard notes this gift as one of the highlights of his wife's career.
"Judy truly has a heart for helping people who can't always help themselves," says office manager Connie Love. "She always looks out for people who are less fortunate, and she treats every patient like family."
Outside of work, Buhrman's happiest place is somewhere in the middle of a trout stream. She and Richard fly fish whenever they can in rivers throughout the Southeast. But they never keep their catch. Instead they pinch the barbs off their hooks and give them a kiss before tossing them back – kiss and release.
"I don't have to catch a big fish," she says. "I don't even have to catch a fish – just put me in the river, looking at the rhododendron, hearing the water. It's a beautiful place to be."
While there are myriad reasons to worry about the future of health care, Buhrman says the dedicated staff at CHI Memorial Community Health gives a glimmer of hope. Buhrman beams as she talks about her co-workers, who she says all share her heart for helping others. In a way the clinic harkens back to a simpler time, when the relationship between patient and provider was the most important thing.
"You can't do anything alone, and I'm really fortunate to be with a lot of great partners," she says. "It's a privilege to know my patients. It gives a real purpose to what you're doing."