New department heads announced at hospital
Posted on Wednesday, November 19, 2008
SILOAM SPRINGS ó Penny McClain, chief executive officer at Siloam Springs Memorial Hospital, recently announced that Barbara Wesner, Maria Wleklinskai, Shirley VanVliet and Danette Cripps were made department heads at the facility.
Wesner is now the employee health nurse and hospital educator. She is a graduate of the University of Arkansas and became a registered nurse in 1978. In 2007 she received a bachelor of science degree in nursing from Florida Hospital College of Health and Sciences.
Wesner began her nursing career at SSMH, where she worked from 1969-1988 as the hospitalís charge nurse in the medical surgical department and in the emergency room. From 1987-1991, she worked as a clinic nurse for Dr. Dan Springer at the Siloam Springs Medical Center, and from 1991 to 1995 as nursing director of Medical Home Health, Sallisaw, Okla. She was employed as nursing director for the Tyson Springdale Complex from 1995 to 2000, and the next two years as home health director for SSMH. When the hospitalís home health department closed, she worked as the occupational RN for McKee Foods in Gentry until 2004. She returned to SSMH as a nurse in the post-anesthesia care unit and became hospital educator in July 2005. The employee health nurse title was added to her duties last month.
Wleklinski is the new emergency room director at SSMH. She became a registered nurse in 1990, after completing studies at St. Elizabeth School of Nursing, Lafayette, Ind. She obtained her BSN in 1996 from St. Josephís College in Rensselaer, Ind.
Wleklinski worked as a staff nurse in ER / labor and delivery from 1994 to 2004, and from 2002-2004 as a staff nurse for University of Chicago Pediatric ER and in a specialized intensive care unit for newborns. She was an emergency room staff nurse at Washington Regional Medical Center from 2004 to 2006, and the device (pacemakers, etc. ) clinic coordinator for Northwest Arkansas Heart and Vascular from 2006 to 2008.
VanVliet has been named infection control practitioner. She received her BSN in 1992. She was an intensive care nurse at Glenwood Regional Medical Center, West Monroe, La., from 1992 to 1994. From 1994 to 1997 she worked in the intensive care unit at SSMH and also was a home health RN. She enjoyed a freelance writing career from 1997 to 2005. Earlier this year before accepting the infection control duties at SSMH, she worked as the clinical marketing liaison for HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital in Fayetteville.
Cripps recently became surgical services director in charge of both surgery and ambulatory services. She received an associate degree in nursing from the University of Arkansas in 1988, and a BSN from Oklahoma Wesleyan University. Her medical career began as a ward clerk at SSMH. She worked from 1986 to 1988 as a nurse aide in the recovery room at a Springdale hospital and from 1989 to 1991 as an RN in the operating room at Washington Regional Medical Center. She then worked more than 13 years at Dogwood Medical Center in Siloam Springs. She spent several months in the ER at SSMH and another short period as an operating room nurse for North Hills Surgery Center. She was hired as an RN at SSMH ís ambulatory surgery unit in 2004 and became director two years later.
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