2001 - Alumni Award Recipients
2001 Alumni Award for Excellence in Nursing
Catherine Garner, B.S.N. ’76, M.S.N. ‘82
Dr. Catherine Garner earned both her B.S.N. and M.S.N. degrees from Vanderbilt University School of Nursing and her doctorate in Public Health from the University of North Carolina. As the dean of the College of Health Sciences and Nursing at the University of Phoenix, Dr. Garner leads a college with over 4,800 students on 36 campuses nationwide.
Dr. Garner served as the 1992 President of the National Association of Women’s Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nursing Association of Women’s Health Obstetrics and Neonatal Nursing. Under her leadership the organization evolved from physician focused to nurse focused.
Prior to her recruitment to the University of Phoenix, Dr. Garner was president of Innovative Strategies, Inc., a Tucson-based firm specializing in strategic planning for health care organizations. She also has been involved in business development and capital acquisition for new e-health businesses. She was instrumental in the development of a private health care system and nurse practitioner program in Tegucigalpa, Honduras and has served as a consultant to the Center of Disease Control and Prevention.
She has spoken at conventions around the world, and her work has appeared in numerous publications. Her career has been dedicated and focused on improving women’s health care and showcasing nurse practitioners as the primary care providers of health care, especially in women’s health.
2001 Alumni Award for Clinical Achievement in Nursing
Elizabeth C. Dayani, B.S.N.’71, M.S.N. ‘72
Ms. Elizabeth Dayani earned both her B.S.N. and M.S.N. from Vanderbilt University School of Nursing. She is a nationally recognized leader in primary care, outpatient services and home health services. Ms. Dayani has served as executive director of program development for Cardiovascular Services of America, where she has developed a nurse practitioner model for cardiology practices to improve both clinical and financial outcomes.
She co-authored The Nurse Entrepreneur, co-founded and grew a national home care and supplemental staffing business, and has worked as a senior executive for numerous publicly traded health care companies.
Her experience includes clinical and operational leadership in due diligence, acquisition, consolidation and standardization of home health care companies. She participated in the development of a national quality council that established clinical and operational outcome measures across the post-acute continuum.
Ms. Dayani’s successes in the clinical area have been numerous. She founded a family nurse practitioner clinic in Lynchburg, Tennessee. At the Metro Health Department, she founded nurse practitioner clinics, which included developing clinical protocols approved by county medical societies. She also developed and implemented a model for nurse-practitioner-managed care clinics in underserved inner city sites. Her expertise in clinical nursing has allowed her to serve as a public speaker and be published in numerous health care articles.
She is married to Dr. John H. Dayani, a health care entrepreneur, has a son and daughter-in-law, and was a past-president of the Julia Hereford Society.
2001 President’s Award of Distinction
Leanne Crabtree Busby, D.S.N., R.N.C., F.A.A.N.P.
Dr. Leanne Busby is a 1987 graduate of the Vanderbilt University School of Nursing and obtained her D.S.N. from the University of Alabama at Birmingham in 1999. She has served as chair for the nursing Division at Cumberland University.
A strong advocate for nurse practitioners and the contributions they make to society, Dr. Busby’s work has been published in numerous publications and she has served on the editorial board for the Journal of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners.
Busby is a charter fellow of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners and was named the Tennessee Nurse Practitioner of the Year in 1995. She has also received the President’s Award for Teaching Excellence from Cumberland University and the Alma E. Gault Leadership Award from the Tennessee Nurses Association.
Her contributions to the field of nursing and her community have been outstanding. Dr. Busby served as executive director for both the Stanton Community Clinic and the Vine Hill Community Clinic. She has taught, mentored and inspired thousands of students on their way to becoming compassionate health care professionals.
In addition to building a distinguished career and providing outstanding service to her community, Dr. Busby has remained extremely active at Vanderbilt. She has served on the Alumni Association Board of Directors for both the School of Nursing and the full university.
2001 Friend of Nursing Award
Dr. Barbara A. Murphy
Dr. Murphy serves Vanderbilt University Medical Center as associate professor of Hematology/Oncology. A graduate of Bowman Gray School of Medicine, she completed her postdoctoral training at Greenwich Hospital and the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Many cancer patients have been touched and helped by her exhaustive research on pain therapy.
She has been published in numerous medical journals and is a reviewer for the Journal of Clinical Oncology. In 1998, the Division of Medical Oncology honored her with the Apple Award. Dr. Murphy is a member of the American Association for Cancer Research, American College of Physicians and the American Pain Society.
Dr. Murphy has always been a good friend of nursing. A talented clinician and holistic physician, she addresses each of her patients’ needs in a thoughtful manner. Dr. Murphy’s respect of nurses as colleagues fosters a healthy exchange of ideas and great things that can be accomplished when doctors and nurses work together as the partners they were meant to be.
2001 Honorary Vanderbilt University School of Nursing Alumnus
Peter I. Buerhaus, Ph.D., R.N., F.A.A.N.
Dr. Peter Buerhaus is the Valere Potter Professor of Nursing and was the senior associate dean for research at Vanderbilt University School of Nursing. He earned his bachelor’s degree in nursing from Mankato State University. He obtained a master’s degree in nursing health services administration at the University of Michigan, and his Ph.D. from Wayne State University.
In 1990, Dr. Buerhaus joined the faculty at the University of Iowa where he developed and taught courses on public policy making and the economics of health care and nursing.
Prior to his Vanderbilt appointment, Dr. Buerhaus was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation faculty fellow in health care finance at the Johns Hopkins University. He then served as director of the Harvard Nursing Research Institute and its post-doctoral program in nursing health services research.
Published numerous times on topics concerning the nursing shortage and changes in the health care system, Dr. Buerhaus is widely recognized as an authority on the subject.
His nationally recognized research on nurse staffing and patient health services has given Vanderbilt University School of Nursing a national spokesperson on the current nursing shortage crises and risks it presents to patients.
