Kelly Hunt, MN, RN, CNL, is the Accredited Provider Program Director (APPD) for the Academy of Medical-Surgical Nurses (AMSN). Get to know Kelly here.

Can you tell the membership a little about yourself, your career, and what inspired you to become a nurse educator? What does that entail?

I was born and raised in Helena, Montana. I began my nursing education in my mid-20s, completing an ASN program in 2007. I worked the next 10 years as a medical-surgical nurse in a variety of hospital settings, ranging from a community hospital to a critical access hospital and, finally, a larger regional hospital while continuing my education. I took on the role of clinical staff educator for my unit in 2016 after working as a staff nurse on the unit for the previous three years.

I was inspired to become a nurse educator because I wanted to be able to expand my influence and affect change that improved the experience of the nurses on my unit as well as the patients we cared for. I started my master’s degree in 2017 and finished in the fall semester of 2020, graduating from Montana State University. I received my certification as a Clinical Nurse Leader (CNL) in the spring of 2021. For the past two years, I have served as the Professional Development Director for the Montana Nurses Association as well as the Accredited Approver Program Director and Accredited Provider Program Director.                                                                        

What are your goals as AMSN’s APPD? What value do you believe AMSN being an American Nurses Credentialing Center-accredited provider will bring to the organization and its members?

My goals as AMSN’s APPD include continuing to build upon our existing educational products while using feedback from the members to present new ways for them to access learning opportunities and to work with the board of directors, volunteers, members, and staff to make AMSN known as the gold standard for continuing education for the medical-surgical nurse. Now that we are an accredited provider in our own right, we have more autonomy to customize our educational products to match the needs of the members and to increase our visibility. We also have the potential to partner with organizations to further our reach and recruit new members.

What do you want members to know about you, and what are you most passionate about, personally and professionally? Do you have a favorite career accomplishment you’d like to share?

I have always been driven to ensure that whatever processes exist have a purpose that makes the work better, more efficient, and maximizes the benefit to everyone impacted by the process. This is something I hope to bring to this role as well by advocating for new and innovative ways to provide education to AMSN’s members and to continue to seek the feedback of our nurses.

My favorite career accomplishment: In 2020, I worked with my colleagues to develop and implement a nurse-driven protocol for following up on patients who had tested positive for COVID-19 but did not require hospitalization. At the time, I was doing outpatient case management and identified a gap in the care continuum that was further burdening our already over-stressed and under-resourced emergency department. A small group of us used best practice guidelines to develop and implement the protocol based on pre-existing risk factors, severity of symptoms, and social determinants of health to identify patients who were most at risk for complications during their COVID infection. We were able to significantly decrease the number of emergency visits for our lower acuity patients through the utilization of this protocol as well as increase the number of patients who were able to remain at home during their illness with outpatient follow up. I submitted my work as an abstract for the 2021 CNL Summit and was selected as a podium presenter.

What do you enjoy doing outside of work?

I enjoy spending time with my family and friends, getting outside (when it’s nice out; I am not a typical Montanan in that I am not a winter sports person), traveling, seeing as much live music as I can, and spending as much time near the water as is humanly possible. Most of all, in true introvert fashion, I enjoy settling in with a cup of tea, a good book, a cozy blanket, and my two cats.