Jessica Donaldson FNP ’17 loves caring for and advocating on behalf of her patients, providing them with information they need to make well informed decisions about their health. Donaldson’s work as a nurse practitioner fills her with purpose. She has spent time working as a trauma nurse in Syracuse, a traveling nurse in locales including Alabama, California and Minnesota, and, most recently, as a clinician in family practice in Camden, N.Y. While all of these professional experiences have been rewarding for Donaldson, the latter has been especially so. It has provided her with the opportunity to provide high quality care in a community where there is a shortage of health care professionals. It helped inspire the graduate of Le Moyne’s Family Nurse Practitioner program to take the next step in her professional journey.
Donaldson and her husband, David, who will graduate from Le Moyne’s FNP program in 2024, are in the process of renovating a provider-owned and operated, family practice office in Camden, a community of approximately 2,200 people in Oneida County. (“It sounds like a lot and it is, but you have to go big or go home,” she jokes.) The couple hopes to serve people from Syracuse, Utica, Rome, Pulaski and Oneida, and to place a particular emphasis on preventative care. Many of their plans for the practice came out of long conversations they had with one another during the Covid-19 pandemic. The public health crisis helped to crystalize how important good, quality medical care is, particularly preventative care. To that end, in addition to the family care that they will provide, they also plan to invite specialists in areas such as radiology, orthopedics (sports medicine), neurology and cardiology, to visit and meet with patients who are unable to travel to see them. It is part of their commitment to help a community that, as Donaldson puts it, “is trying to thrive and grow.” It will also be a family initiative as Jessica and David will be joined at work by their three oldest children: Jacklyn, who is training to become a nurse, Joshua, who is studying medical billing and Eric, who is learning how to make referrals and work with outside providers. Their two youngest children, Sophia 12 and Taylor 10, will have to wait a few years to join them, but Donaldson said she hopes they will be part of the practice too one day.
At the same time, she is undertaking this new professional journey, Donaldson is in the midst of her studies as a member of the inaugural class in Le Moyne’s Doctor of Nursing Practice program. She says that returning to the classroom again has been “wonderful – and a process of self-discovery.” It has inspired her to continue to think about the differences she hopes to make in the lives of her patients.
“It’s all about your family, your health care, your way,” she says.
“No matter what your background is, where you come from or where you think you are heading, dedication, determination and goal setting is extremely important.”
This story is part of a series of stories on the College’s Doctor of Nursing Practice program.
Among the attributes that make Le Moyne’s nursing program distinct is that it offers prospective students direct admission to the program, with a seat guaranteed to them if they meet certain academic requirements. In addition, students are able to take nursing courses during their first year in the program. They also have access to a number of academic resources, including the College’s Writing Center and Quantitative Reasoning Center and a professional nursing tutor.