Karen Daley

Karen Daley, resident of Boston, Massachusetts holds a diploma in nursing from Catherine Laboure School of Nursing, a bachelor’s of science in nursing from Curry College, a master’s in public health from Boston University School of Public Health, a master’s in science and PhD in nursing from Boston College (American Nurses Association). In 2010, Daley was elected as President of the American Nursing Association, which is an organization representing the interests of the nation’s 3.1 million registered nurses (American Nurses Association). Despite working as a practicing nurse and nurse advocate, she is also a nurse researcher and writer. Daley has written numerous articles and currently is a reviewer for a couple of nursing journals. She is known for the legislation mandating the use of safer needle devices. Her testimony to the chairman explains why she had great concerns for safer needle devices. In July of 1998, while working in a hospital emergency department where Karen Daley had been a nurse for more than 20 years, she sustained a needle stick. After a routine occupational health follow-up five months later - two days before Christmas – she received the horrifying news that she might be HIV and Hepatitis C positive. Just before New Year’s of 1999 she was told both infections had been confirmed. She described that It was impossible for her to describe for us how that one moment - the moment when she reached her gloved hand into a needle box to dispose of the needle with which she had drawn blood - has drastically changed her life (Daley, 2000). This incident with her leads her to travel around the world to raise awareness among nurses and health care administrators about the importance of “needlestick prevention.” Her hard work and determination to pass a law paid off on November 6, 2000, when President Bill Clinton signed the “Needlestick Safety Prevention Act”, and Karen Daley was at the White House, who watched him sign the Act.
Work Cited

Cited: American Nurses Association . (n.d.). Nevada Healthcare Forum. Retrieved January 27, 2012, from www.nevadahealthcareforum.com/bio/Bio-KarenDaley.pdf Daley, K. (2000, June 20). Testimony of Karen Daley. House Committee on Education and Labor, Republicans :: Home Page. Retrieved January 27, 2012, from http://archives.republicans.edlabor.house.gov/archive/hearings/106th/wp/needlestick62200/daley.htm