It's that time of year again… Yes, clocks turn back for some of us and Halloween, Autumn and football are all something many of us look forward to. What we don't look forward to at this time of the year is influenza.

Pandemic! A word that we learned in nursing school. A word that was synonymous with widespread death and tragedy. A word we were aware of but existed oftentimes outside our sphere of professional nursing practice and our lives.

Fall has always been my favorite time of year; not only for the cooler weather, football, and chili, but also because of the beginning of a new school year.

Like many things disrupted by COVID-19 in 2020, AMSN’s annual convention will no longer be an in-person event in Las Vegas, but rather a virtual event where you can attend from the comfort and safety of your own home.

Every day, med-surg nurses promote health, protect patients and save lives. Now, AMSN is at work enabling med-surg nurses to adapt their vital skills to the arena of nursing policy advocacy.

Your voice is needed now to support med-surg nursing priorities as Congress works on COVID-19 relief legislation! AMSN and our coalition partners at the Nursing Community Coalition have continued urging members of the House and Senate to support strong supplies of PPE and needed health care funding.

Let's travel, through the AMSN Convention.

Whew, what a year 2020 has been. We’ve seen our worlds turned upside down and inside out. The breadth and depth of issues facing us all has been, at times, overwhelming and exhausting. Sometimes it’s too much and it’s hard to make sense of what we’re seeing, hearing and experiencing. In times of chaos, we need our community more than ever.

Several times in the past two weeks I have found myself needing to stop what I’m doing, pause for a moment and take some deep breaths. Have you felt this way too?

In last month’s CEO Corner, I shared my reckoning with you and my pledge to be a better ally and do my absolute best to ensure AMSN and MSNCB are diverse, inclusive, and equitable organizations. We are committed to doing so, both organizations are fully on board with pledging our commitment. To that end, you will see some additional work in the next couple of weeks and further into the future.