GREATER GRAND RAPIDS CHAPTER

Board Members:

Dear Greater Grand Rapids MICNP Members:

We are offto a terrific New Year, and had a very nice turnout for the January 29 dinner meeting at Naya's in Grand Rapids.  Dr. Matt Powell gave an interesting presentation on "New Approaches in the Management of Musculoskeletal Pain" which was sponsored by Allison Goushaw of Cephalon.

The Board met the last week of January to have a formal "hand over of power" from the 2008 board, and as mentioned at the dinner meeting, we cannot thank Leona Meengs, Brenda Pawl and Neita Dorais enough for their tireless efforts in starting the MICNP Greater Grand Rapids Chapter just a few years ago.  They have nurtured it along to its present membership of over 65 members, including 10 NP students.  A special thanks also goes to Neita, who took the lead to be on the 2009 MICNP State Conference Committee so that we could have the privilege of hosting the 2010 MICNP State Conference in Grand Rapids.  This required a great deal of her personal time, however if it was not for Neita's contribution to the Greater Grand Rapids Chapter, we would not be receiving the honor of being the host for MICNP in 2010.

Grand Rapids will be the site of the State MICNP 2010 conference, which is planned for Spring.  Mary Barr is currently working on securing a site for the conference, which is usually held from a Friday to a Sunday.  We are told to plan for 350+, so I am hoping we can host the best conference ever!  Of coarse, once the planning is really underway, we will be asking for volunteers from the membership to help facilitate the planning.

We are also looking at ways to increase communication, so name tags will be available at each dinner meeting, and attendees will introduce themselves and identify their specialty areas prior to the presentation.  We also want to start each meeting with the celebration of the successes of the members, and will be asking for this input prior to each meeting.

The State MICNP  conference is scheduled for March 20-22 in Troy, Michigan.  The educational tracks being offered include Primary Care, Acute/Critical Care, Pediatrics/Women's Health and "Miscellaneous."  Cost for the full conference is $190 for members prior to march 6 and $215 after March 6.  Cost for students for the full conference is $130 prior to March 6 and $155 after March 6.  A block of rooms has been reserved at the Somerset Inn for a conference rate of $95 per night and reservations may be made by calling 248-643-7800.  I encourage members to network and share rides, rooms, etc. to help decrease costs.  All registrations may be done through the MICNP website at www.micnp.org.  For questions call 734-432-9881 or email micnp@arounddetroit.biz. 

The Board has made some preliminary goals for the 2009 year and we will be setting up an online questionnaire to obtain input from MICNP members.  Some of our preliminary goals include planning for the 2010 conference, increasing membership to 100 members, maintaining our educational dinner meetings, and updating the Greater Grand Rapids Chapter's site on the State MICNP website.  We will also keep members up to date on legislation that pertains to NP practice. 

We will be having a dinner meeting in February and complete information will be sent to the membership in the near future.  I encourage you all to participate fully in MICNP, voice your opinions, share your knowledge, and celebrate with other Nurse Practitioners.  As always, I encourage you to invite other NPs to join our organization.

Maureen Ryan, President, MICNP Greater Grand Rapids Chapter

Important Links:
www.michigandrugprices.com