Mississippi Chapter

Year Chapter was Founded:
September 24, 1994, with our chapter’s certificate received @ National ANAC Conference in Nashville, Tennessee.  Three founding members were present.

Founding Chapter Members: 
•    Cheryl Hamill,
•    Connie Thompson,
•    Marie Anderson,
•    Margaret Buhner,
•    Elise Houston,
•    Jean Kirk.

The formation of the Mississippi Chapter was initiated by one of its members who was and is currently the program coordinator of the Mississippi AIDS Training Center.  She attended ANAC conference in the Los Angeles in the early 90’s and returned with such enthusiasm that sparks began to fly for chapter formation.  She rallied five other nurses currently involved in HIV/AIDS care to unite and additional energies were attained to move forward on the task of achieving a charter.  Meetings were held in various homes, at several hospitals, and forms were received and completed with documentation as instructed.  After compliance was met to all criteria for receiving a charter, ANAC granted our chapter’s charter, signed, September 24, 1994.

Over the past eleven years of our chapter’s existence, we have maintained a membership of approximately 14-20 members.  We continue to have a very active core group and are continuously recruiting new members and reaching out to even more.  Our collaborative efforts have taken us to international endeavors.  Our outreach continues to be supportive of local activities as well as far-reaching.  We feed our own (members) but always delight in hosting new persons to our group whether they join or not.  Over the years we have never had chapter dues and have functioned with minimal finances from two fund raising activities and support with pharmaceutical dinner programs.  The two fund raising activities have been a bake sale on Valentine’s Day and another sale on World AIDS Day in December.

In the beginning we thought our chapter would serve only those nurses of the central area of our state.  Through the decade we have realized that we are and probably will remain the only chapter in our state, so have initiated proceedings in changing our chapter’s name to Mississippi Chapter of Nurses in AIDS Care.  With this change, we feel all nurses are included and are welcome.  We will also host educational dinner programs to include 2-4 sites simultaneously, with support of power point/emails/phone conference capabilities during the remainder of the year.

With support of national and The Chapter’s Committee, we continue to empower our members and tap into their many talents as we strengthen our foundation and that of our national organization.

Chapter Presidents
1994    Cheryl Hamill
1995    Cheryl Hamill
1996    Connie Thompson
1997    Marie Anderson
1998    Cheryl Hamill
1999    Debbie Konkle-Parker
2000    Sharyn Janes
2001    Stacey Ingram
2002    Connie Thompson
2003    Janice Pierce
2004    Connie Thompson
2005    Connie Thompson
2006    Debbie Konkle-Parker
2007    Tabitha Wells
2008    Janice Pierce-Pouns

Significant Chapter Events:

• 1994    Charter of the Chapter
• 1995    Statewide Clinical Resource Directory
• 1996    Monthly ‘brown bag’ journaling sessions @ noon
• 1997    Through 1998, members served as JANAC reviewers, and also one member served as Chapter’s Chairperson
• 1997    Four members become ACRN’s at annual conference in Chicago, First offering of the certification
• 1998    Two more members become ACRN’s @ Memphis site.   Others continued to become certified within the next few years.
• 1998    Several members receive the “HIV Outstanding Service Award” in the state of Mississippi
• 1999    Legislative advocacy for state HIV medication funding
• 2000    National position statements to ANAC from our chapter
• 2001    Continued support of local members to national for position statements/involvement in national activities ANAC/JANAC
• 2002    Continued support to Cuban nurses to the national ANAC organization; membership dues.
• 2003    Continued outreach to HIV residential homes w/ special projects from the chapter
• 2004    Collaborative outreach w/ State Dept. of Health in HIV screenings and other health care screening in high risk areas. Writing retreat held on the coast
• 2005    Member served on the JANAC Editorial Board
• 2002-04    Member served on the ANAC Research Committee
• 2002-04    Several members receive an award sponsored by our chapter - University of Mississippi School of Nursing Gary Hudsbeth Award
• 2002-03 Member served on the National Conference Planning Committee
• 2004-06    Member served on the Association of Nurses in AIDS Care Research Committee
• 2004-08    Member currently serves on the HIV Medicine Association Board of Directors
• 2005    New take on dinner programs;  “Pizza and a Program”, which have proven to be inexpensive, fun, and extremely informative with a new venue of informality.
• 2006    Intense outreach to HIV+ persons and special work related to volunteer activities to pull membership together and extend personal HIV mission outreach.
• 2007    Intensive on-site HIV Educational offerings to an HIV transitional-residential home.  These offerings were held monthly and conducted by a different member each month.