By Laura Lesley
Two alumni of the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Nursing have been named Fellows of the American Academy of Nursing (AAN), increasing the number of UAB School of Nursing-associated fellows to 93. They will be inducted at the Academy’s annual conference in Washington, D.C., which will take place October 24-26, 2019.
Graduates Cathy Rozmus, PhD, RN, and Rhigel Tan, DNP, RN, APRN, GNP, ANP, PMHNP, are among 231 highly distinguished nurse leaders who have been chosen to be part of the 2019 class of Academy fellows.
Rozumus is the endowed PARTNERS Professor and Vice Dean for Academic Affairs at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston Cizik School of Nursing. She is also Assistant Vice President for Institutional Assessment and Enhancement in the Office of Academic and Research Affairs at UTHealth. Rozmus earned her Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Nursing from the UAB School of Nursing in 1990.
Tan is an assistant professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and actively practices as a nurse practitioner specializing in mental health and psychiatry, as well as in behavioral health and wellness in his standalone clinic in Las Vegas, iCarePsychiatry. He is the first Filipino American to be elected president of the Nevada State Board of Nursing and is an advocate for personalized medicine, which uses pharmacogenetics to match ideal medications to individual patients. Tan earned his Master of Science in Nursing (MSN) from the UAB School of Nursing in 2010.
Induction as a fellow of the AAN is a significant milestone in a nurse leader’s career. Fellows are selected through a competitive and rigorous process where hundreds of applications are reviewed by a committee of elected fellows. New fellows are selected based on their impressive contributions to increase access, reduce cost and improve quality through nursing theory, practice and science.