A Young Mother Is Celebrating the Holidays After a Health Scare Led to Lifesaving Care at Mount Sinai

Updated on Dec 12, 2025 | Featured

Lindsay MacOdrum visited Times Square shortly before she and her family, including her son Tommy, 9, took a bike ride in Central Park, where she went into cardiac arrest and collapsed. She was able to recover and return to her life in Canada thanks to her stepson Maddox, 17, who began CPR, and to the quick actions of emergency responders and doctors at Mount Sinai Morningside.

Lindsay MacOdrum and her family have a lot to be thankful for this holiday season—a new chance at life after an unexpected health scare almost turned deadly during a family trip to New York City.

And it could have happened to virtually anyone.

The 41-year-old mother and elementary school teacher was visiting from Canada last June with her family. During a bike ride in New York’s Central Park, she went into cardiac arrest and collapsed in front of her kids. Her teenage stepson immediately began CPR (he just learned it a week before for a job as a camp counselor). She was rushed to Mount Sinai Morningside. Emergency responders thought her chances of survival were slim. Her parents would later fly in to say their goodbyes.

But thanks to the quick actions of paramedics and doctors in the Emergency Department, and then a medical procedure that discovered an undetected heart condition, she is now back home and her heart is functioning normally.

“The reason she was able to walk out of the hospital and why she is now living her life is because she had early CPR,” says Dan Pugliese, MD, a cardiologist at the Mount Sinai Fuster Heart Hospital at Mount Sinai Morningside, who cared for Ms. MacOdrum. “You don’t need to be a doctor or a nurse to be able to do CPR and save a loved one or a stranger.”

“It’s very rare for someone like her who is young, active, and in great physical shape to experience this,” says Dan Pugliese, MD, a cardiologist at the Mount Sinai Fuster Heart Hospital at Mount Sinai Morningside who cared for Ms. MacOdrum, told the Toronto Sun. About one in 1,000 people in the United States experience such a sudden cardiac incident, according to Dr. Pugliese, a specialist in heart rhythm disorders.

For Ms. MacOdrum, the episode was a powerful reminder not to ignore unusual medical symptoms, as well as the importance of learning CPR. “It’s a miracle that I am alive,” she told the newspaper.

“The reason she was able to walk out of the hospital and why she is now living her life is because she had early CPR,” adds Dr. Pugliese. “You don’t need to be a doctor or a nurse to be able to do CPR and save a loved one or a stranger.” Another reason she was able to recover fairly quickly was that she was in good physical condition.

Ms. MacOdrum had always lived an active lifestyle. A former soccer player, she has been an avid runner and works as a physical education teacher. She thought she was the epitome of health. She and her family lived in a picturesque small town about 50 miles from Toronto.

She was shocked to learn later that she had been living with a heart condition.

Looking back on her situation, she recognizes she had symptoms that she didn’t realize were associated with a heart problem.

Weeks earlier, she had to pause during her daily runs because she was out of breath. She felt tired when she was teaching.

In June, the family traveled to the New York area so that her nine-year-old son Tommy could play in a hockey tournament in New Jersey.  Days before the incident, she felt shoulder pain while watching her son’s tournament. She figured she was just exhausted and sore.

On Sunday, June 15, the family decided to take an afternoon bike ride in Central Park. Suddenly, she didn’t feel well. She got off the bike, and laid down. Her face turned blue/grey and her husband thought she was having a seizure. She lost consciousness and her stepson Maddox, 17, began chest compressions while a bystander called 911. A doctor and a nurse continued performing CPR for another six minutes before an ambulance arrived, according to the newspaper account.

She would subsequently go into sudden cardiac arrest and had no pulse for 30 minutes. Paramedics shocked her heart five times in the ambulance on the way to the emergency room. Her situation was dire. She regained her pulse at Mount Sinai Morningside, but she was in a coma, on a ventilator in the ICU.

Five days later, she started to improve. A cardiac MRI detected an undiagnosed cardiomyopathy (weakening of the heart muscle) which led to the arrhythmia (irregular heart beat) that caused the cardiac arrest. After the team of cardiologists in the ICU helped her recover, Dr. Pugliese performed a procedure to place a defibrillator in her heart to shock it back into a normal rhythm if it detects another dangerous arrhythmia to prevent another life-threatening event.

After 12 days in the hospital, she was able to fly home, with a nurse sitting next to her on the plane, according to the newspaper account. Now, months later her heart is functioning normally at over 50 percent compared to 30 percent when the incident took place, when measuring the efficiency of how the heart pumps blood.

She is running about five miles a day, doing some light weight training, and hopes to return to work in January, according to the newspaper. And she wants others to learn from her experience. If something suddenly feels out of the ordinary, she’s urging women to take this seriously and see a doctor. Her doctor agrees.

“If there’s a pattern of you feeling different, that something is not quite right, that’s a clue to go and get it checked out,” says Dr. Pugliese. “As cardiologists, we’re happy to see a patient to make sure we are not missing something. And if we do find something, we know what to do.”

It’s especially important because doctors now understand that heart issues can affect a diverse group of people.

“There is this pervasive myth that young women don’t develop heart disease, that it’s only old men who smoke cigarettes and have high cholesterol,” he adds. “But that’s not the case. There are many different types of heart disease that can develop, and not all heart disease starts with chest pain.”

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Early Exposure to Peanuts Can Help Reduce the Risk of Developing Allergies in Children

Updated on Dec 2, 2025 | Allergy, Featured, Research

Over the past decades, doctors and researchers have learned a lot about food allergies, conducting many studies that have helped us get closer to understanding why such allergies might occur and, potentially, preventing them from developing.

The current understanding is that exposing young children to peanut protein may reduce the likelihood that they develop peanut allergies as they grow up. The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) issued guidelines recommending early introduction of peanut-containing foods to infants in 2017.

“Over the past two to three decades, we have learned a lot, and allergists and pediatricians have changed their thinking and recommendations as new evidence and studies point us one way or another,” says Scott Sicherer, MD, Director of the Elliot and Roslyn Jaffe Food Allergy Institute at Mount Sinai Kravis Children’s Hospital, who was also involved in the development of the NIAID 2017 guidelines.

How might peanut allergies—or food allergies in general—develop in people, and how might introducing peanuts at a young age help reduce this allergy risk? How can parents safely introduce peanut products to their young children? Dr. Sicherer explains the science and research behind this topic.

Scott Sicherer, MD, Director of the Elliot and Roslyn Jaffe Food Allergy Institute, and Chief of the Serena and John Liew Division of Pediatric Allergy and Immunology in Mount Sinai’s Department of Pediatrics.

Do we know what causes peanut—or food—allergies in general?
There are many ways to answer this question, but to answer broadly, it boils down to two things: environment and genetics.

Environment can include diet, the way we live, where we live, what the child and household are doing. Is there a dog in the house? How are we using antibiotics and soaps? Was the baby born by cesarian section? There is evidence that seems to link higher rates of allergies to babies born by C-section. The list could go on and on.

The genetics side has also been extensively studied. We had done studies at Mount Sinai on the role genetics might play in peanut allergies, comparing identical and fraternal twins, and found that genetics has a lot to do with it. We found a lot of heritability of allergies, where having a family history of it is also a risk factor for the baby.

Has the rate of peanut allergies in children increased over time?
Our institute at Mount Sinai looked at this rate over an 11-year period. We started in 1997, where we did a random survey of households across the United States, and asked about children and adults having peanut allergies. We did that same survey in 2002 and 2008 as well.

In 1997, we found the reported rate for children with a peanut allergy to be 0.4 percent, or1 in 250 children. In adults, that rate was 0.7 percent, or 1 in 150 adults. In 2002, that rate for children doubled to 0.8 percent, or 1 in 125 children, and the rate for adults was roughly the same, at 0.6 percent.

In 2008, we did the survey again, and I was shocked by the number for children, which was 1.4 percent, or 1 in 70 children. That’s almost a tripling from 1997, while the rate for adults in 2008 remained the same.

At first, I wondered if there was an issue with our survey. But it should have been accurate because our method was the same across the years. I was convinced when our 2008 findings were matched with studies coming out of Australia, Canada, and England at that time, which were reporting prevalence rates of more than 1 percent for children as well. So it did seem there was a real increase between 1997 and 2008.

What might have caused this increase?
One way to think about this phenomenon would be to think first about the mechanism behind allergies, which is the immune system. Our immune system has evolved over thousands of years and various exposures to the environment to fight off germs and pathogens. It has a tough job of destroying these dangerous invaders while having to recognize and smartly ignore innocent proteins, like those in foods, or types of bacteria that are helpful to our bodies.

What if the ground rules changed quickly, and the immune system was faced with relatively sudden changes that made it harder to adapt and attack the right potential dangers entering our body?

The “hygiene hypothesis” posits that our modern, industrialized society could be a cause for the increased allergy rates. Exposure to fewer or different germs, while making us healthy in some ways, could result in the immune system going out of balance and attacking things it should be ignoring, like allergens including pollens, animal dander, and foods. Add to that the many other changes in our modern world, we have a perfect storm for trouble.

Furthermore, back in the 1990s and 2000s, the prevailing understanding—based on early studies—was for mothers, if they had babies who were at high risk of developing allergy, to avoid allergens during pregnancy and breastfeeding. They were also recommended to avoid feeding babies cow milk until age one, eggs until age two, and fish and nuts until age three—these were from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) in the year 2000.

By 2008, there were new studies showing that delayed introduction of allergenic foods might increase the risk of developing allergies. Around that time, I joined the AAP committee to rescind the previous recommendations.

What studies support early introduction of peanuts for reducing allergy risk?
A notable study started when Gideon Lack, MD, MSc, a professor of pediatric allergy at King’s College London, observed that in Israel, infants were often fed a peanut butter snack, Bamba, and that diagnoses of peanut allergies there were low. He conducted a study, published in Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology in 2008, that found that Israeli infants aged 8 to 14 months consumed a monthly median of 7.1 grams of peanut protein, and had a prevalence of peanut allergy of 0.17 percent. In the UK, the same age group consumed a monthly median of 0 grams of peanut protein, and the peanut allergy prevalence was 1.85 percent.

This prompted a landmark clinical trial, substantially funded by NIAID, called the Learning Early About Peanut (LEAP) study. The study assessed how infants ages 4 months to 11 months old with eczema and/or egg allergy—and thus at high risk for developing peanut allergies—would fare if fed peanut snacks until 60 months of age, compared with a group that avoided peanut products. The results, published in The New England Journal of Medicine in 2015, found that the prevalence of peanut allergies among those following the advice was 17.3 percent in the avoidance group, whereas the consumption group’s prevalence was 0.3 percent.

What do medical professionals and organizations recommend now?
In 2008, NIAID established a committee—which Hugh Sampson, MD, the Kurt Hirschhorn, M.D./The Children’s Center Foundation Professor of Pediatrics at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, was part of—to develop guidelines for the diagnosis and management of food allergies. At the time, the committee, like the AAP, didn’t make any active recommendations regarding early introduction of allergenic food, other than not delaying them in a set of guidelines in 2010.

When the LEAP study results came out, NIAID updated its guidelines in 2017—Dr. Sampson and I were authors—this time encouraging early peanut introduction, and with instructions about how to do it. There’s a resource called Appendix D that describes how to get peanuts safely into the diet, because peanuts and peanut butter can be a choking hazard for babies. Professional medical organizations, including the AAP and the American Academy of Family Physicians, have since adopted similar recommendations on the early introduction of peanuts. Additional guidelines extrapolate the advice to other common allergens—like milk, egg, and tree nuts—for them to be included in the diet in infant-safe forms on a regular basis, essentially treating solid foods as equivalent whether they are common allergens or not.

How can I begin introducing peanuts early for my child, safely?
If you’re nervous or worried, it’s helpful to talk to your pediatrician. They can walk you through ways of smoothing out peanut products into water, pureed fruits, or vegetables to give them safely. They’ll also be able to let you know how often and how much to feed your baby, as it does require a routine diet for it to confer a protective effect.

The bottom line is: If your baby is otherwise healthy and hasn’t had any problems with food allergies, typical food allergens can be added to a diverse diet, just like any other food in its safe form.

However, if your baby is already showing signs of allergy or problems with various foods, absolutely talk to your pediatrician, who may work with an allergist to fine-tune a path forward. The exciting thing is we do have treatments for food allergy now, and there are many great things happening in the field. Talking to your doctor can help your child lead a healthy, fulfilling life without the overhanging fear of triggering food allergies.

Appendix D instructions for home feeding of peanut protein for a low-risk infant

General instructions Feeding instructions
1. Feed your infant only when they are healthy; do not feed if they have a cold, are vomiting, or have diarrhea or other illnesses. 1. Prepare a full portion of the peanut-containing food.
2. Give the first peanut feeding at home, not at a daycare center or restaurant. 2. Offer your infant a small part of the peanut serving on the tip of the spoon.
3. Make sure at least one adult is able to pay full attention to the infant, without distractions. 3. Wait 10 minutes.
4. Make sure to spend at least two hours with the infant after feeding, to watch for any signs of allergic reaction. 4. If there’s no allergic reaction after the small taste, then slowly give the remainder of the peanut-containing food at the infant’s usual eating speed.

Fostering Connections and Collaborations With AI Grand Rounds

Nov 19, 2025 | Artificial Intelligence, Featured, School

The Windreich Department of Artificial Intelligence and Human Health at Mount Sinai hosts a monthly AI Grand Rounds, which serves as a forum for clinicians and researchers to share their findings. The October 2025 session featured Vera Sorin, MD, Cardiothoracic Imaging Fellow at the Mayo Clinic as a speaker.

To foster better awareness and collaboration of AI efforts, the Windreich Department of Artificial Intelligence and Human Health (AIHH) at Mount Sinai established its monthly Grand Rounds—sessions for faculty, trainees, and staff to share ideas, learn about cutting-edge developments, and explore how AI and data science are transforming research and clinical care.

“The Grand Rounds series reflects our ongoing commitment to fostering dialogue, intellectual curiosity, and innovation at the intersection of technology and human health,” said Girish N. Nadkarni, MD, MPH, CPH, Chair of AIHH.

Modeled after medical Grand Rounds—but adapted to the unique focus of AI—the series provides a venue where clinicians, data scientists, and researchers can come together to discuss challenges, share insights, and identify opportunities for synergy.

Each Grand Rounds features invited speakers who are recognized leaders in their fields—both within Mount Sinai and from the broader AI and biomedical research communities. Presentations may cover topics such as machine learning applications in health care, ethical AI, biomedical informatics, and translational data science.

The AI Grand Rounds invites speakers who are recognized leaders in their fields, both from within Mount Sinai and externally. In Dr. Sorin’s presentation, she talked about post-deployment AI monitoring in health care radiology, challenges with foundation models, and innovative ways to overcome them.

The inaugural session kicked off in September, with Anthony Costa, PhD, Director of Digital Biology at Nvidia, as its featured speaker, who presented about accelerating the representation of biology and human health with artificial intelligence. The October session’s featured speaker, Vera Sorin, MD, Cardiothoracic Imaging Fellow at the Mayo Clinic, presented on post-deployment AI monitoring in health care radiology, discussing both technical and performance monitoring approaches at Mayo and addressing challenges with foundation models.

The schedule for 2026 is currently being confirmed, with AIHH leadership planning on balancing internal and external voices for the sessions.

Beyond highlighting excellence in research, organizers hope the AIHH Grand Rounds can inspire new methodologies, help participants explore interdisciplinary research ideas, and build meaningful professional connections, said Dr. Nadkarni.

“These sessions are designed to spark new collaborations, inspire cross-departmental initiatives, and deepen our shared understanding of how artificial intelligence can advance human health,” said Dr. Nadkarni. “Over time, we hope the Grand Rounds will serve not only as a learning platform but also as a catalyst for innovation that drives the Department’s research and clinical missions forward.”

Learn more about the Windreich Department of Artificial Intelligence and Human Health and AI Grand Rounds

How to Prepare for Pregnancy: Mount Sinai’s Preconception Guide

Updated on Nov 21, 2025 | Featured, Your Health

If you are thinking about getting pregnant, now is the perfect time to focus on your preconception health. Before you start planning baby names or decorating the nursery, the choices you make today—how you eat, move, and care for yourself—can help set the stage for a healthy pregnancy and a healthy baby.

To make this step easier, Mount Sinai obstetrician-gynecologists and midwives created a short, engaging video series called So, You Are Thinking About Getting Pregnant…

Each video offers practical, expert-backed advice on how to prepare for pregnancy and feel confident along the way. Watch the full video series here.

Why Preconception Health Matters

“This is your window of opportunity to make small, meaningful changes that can have a big impact later,” says Susan Rothenberg, MD, obstetrician-gynecologist at Mount Sinai-Union Square.

Taking care of your health before pregnancy can:

  • Boost your chances of conceiving naturally
  • Lower the risk of complications during pregnancy
  • Support your baby’s growth and development from day one
  • Help you feel more confident and in control as you plan for the future

Expert OB-GYN Advice: What to Do Before You Conceive

Each episode in Mount Sinai’s video series addresses common pre-pregnancy questions such as:

  • Should I start taking prenatal vitamins or folic acid?
  • Do I need to update my vaccines?
  • Are there medications I should stop or switch?
  • What about caffeine, alcohol, or vaping?
  • Should I change my diet or exercise routine?

You will also find helpful tips on topics you may not have considered yet—such as why you should visit the dentist before pregnancy, how to plan safe travel, and whether or not to track ovulation.

“This is the time to invest in your health,” says Morgan Whalon, MD, an obstetrician-gynecologist at The Mount Sinai Hospital. “A preconception visit can make a huge difference. It is not just about preventing problems—it is about helping you feel informed and confident as you begin this next chapter.”

Meet the team and schedule your visit
Watch the video series on YouTube

Six Nursing Studies and Their Global Reach

Nov 6, 2025 | Artificial Intelligence, Featured, Nursing

Elvira Solis, MSN, RN, CCRN

A clinical nurse at Mount Sinai Queens, Elvira Solis, MSN, RN, CCRN, is impacting care far beyond her hospital’s walls. What started as an idea to enhance pupillary assessment—checking the eyes— among critical care patients evolved into a quality improvement (QI) project that led to a formal presentation at Mount Sinai’s Nursing Research Day in 2024. Her findings spread throughout the Mount Sinai Health System, and she is now disseminating her team’s work through an abstract published in the peer-reviewed nursing journal Practical Implementation of Nursing Science (PINS).

“Innovation comes from the bedside,” Ms. Solis says. “As front-liners, nurses have an unmatched capacity and power to step up, change practice, and promote excellent care. It’s all about advancing the practice and improving patient outcomes.”

Ms. Solis led one of six nursing studies featured at Nursing Research Day 2024 that were written up as abstracts and published in PINS. Organized annually by the Center for Nursing Research and Innovation (CNRI) at Mount Sinai, Nursing Research Day is day-long symposium featuring discussions with nationally recognized nurse researchers and presentations by clinical nurses across the Mount Sinai Health System and the greater New York nursing community. The next Nursing Research Day will be held Friday, February 27, 2026, at The Mount Sinai Hospital’s Stern Auditorium, and will focus on the value of research and innovation projects conducted by nurses in clinical settings. PINS is an open-access, peer-reviewed journal for nurses engaged in clinical practice that was launched in partnership with the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai’s Levy Library Press in 2021.

The six teams that presented their findings and were later published in PINS represent a growing number of bedside nurses who are turning to research, QI, and evidence-based practice projects to bring their skill, knowledge, insights, critical thinking, and experience to the next level. By generating evidence-based nursing knowledge and more broadly sharing their findings—with topics ranging from virtual nursing to cardiac arrest response—these nurses are dramatically expanding the reach and influence of their practice.

Loriel Lozano, BSN, RN, CSRN, CCRN-CMC

“Nurses are in a perfect position to make critical changes that extend beyond the bedside,” says Loriel Lozano, BSN, RN, CSRN, CCRN-CMC, a critical care nurse in the Intensive Care Unit at Mount Sinai Queens. “And because we’re at the bedside, we spend more time with the patient, see how everything works from point A to point B, and can observe what’s happening at the perfect time.”

Knowing that seconds matter in a cardiac arrest response, Mr. Lozano recognized an opportunity to shave valuable time off the cardiac arrest responses on the hospital’s Medical-Surgical (Med-Surg) unit. The approach focused on modifying simple steps to be done before the team arrives.  In his first time leading a QI project, Mr. Lozano sought input from the Education Department at Mount Sinai Queens and the CNRI to create a standard response protocol and the associated training for staff. “I can’t say enough about the support I received throughout the process,” he says. “Their guidance was invaluable, and the CNRI has a really robust website where I could access the information I needed at each step.”

Ksenia Gorbenko, PhD

Ksenia Gorbenko, PhD, Associate Professor, Population Health Science and Policy, Icahn School of Medicine, is a medical sociologist by training, whose collaborations focus on improving health care delivery through the qualitative evaluation of program implementation, including machine learning/artificial intelligence models, remote patient monitoring, and hospital-at-home. Working with Mount Sinai Nursing, her team’s PINS abstract examines aspects of virtual nursing, one of the hottest topics in the field, about which there is limited research available.

“The future is here,” Dr. Gorbenko says. “We’re witnessing a global nursing shortage and an expansion of telehealth. We need to meet this moment—thoughtfully—from the nursing perspective. While the hands-on components of nursing are essential to care giving, there are indirect care tasks—medication reconciliation, patient sitting, certain documentation—that can be separated out and taken off the clinical nurse’s plate. This gives bedside nurses more hands-on, high-quality time with their patients. We saw this work well in our Med-Surg pilot, and I think it can work well on other units.”

He adds, “Our research is about making these types of transitions purposefully and effectively. And by disseminating our findings more broadly, we’re able to help other organizations get a jumpstart and learn from our lead.”

Melinda Ramroop, MSN, RN-BC

Melinda Ramroop, MSN, RN-BC, is a unit-based educator at Mount Sinai South Nassau, who in 2024 embarked on her first-ever QI project. Her focus was on improving the transition for new graduate nurses by adding specific evidence-based skill sessions to their orientation process.

“Anecdotally, we found that after the classes they appeared more confident,” Ms. Ramroop says. “They had more knowledge on certain tasks, and overall, we saw an increase in staff satisfaction in both the preceptors and the new graduate nurses.”

Equally important, Ms. Ramroop and her team have disseminated their findings through the nursing education team, Nursing Research Day, PINS, and social media.

“This exposure to research and nursing has reframed my whole way of thinking,” Ms. Ramroop says. “I now see certain things on the unit, and my instant thought is: How can we make this a research project?  If one person has an idea, and we’re able to disseminate it, this may help other people or other institutions to better their practice. Ultimately, all of this benefits our main focus: promoting excellence in patient care, but on a broader level.”

Alyssa Ramkissoon, RN, BSN

Study ideas can be inspired by any number of observations and experiences and can lead to unexpected opportunities. Alyssa Ramkissoon, RN, BSN, a Med-Surg nurse at Mount Sinai West, recognized the importance of integrating palliative care into the plan of care when a close family member faced a life-threatening condition. At the time, she was a nursing student at the Mount Sinai Phillips School of Nursing.

“Unlike hospice patients, palliative care patients continue to receive curative therapies,” she says. “Yet, there was a lot of uncertainty about what it meant to enter palliative care, and I saw a valuable opportunity to bridge that gap.”

Through a literature review, Ms. Ramkissoon found the COMFORT Communication Project, which was funded by the National Cancer Institute and Archstone Foundation, and seemed to address her needs. So—as a nursing student—she contacted the founder of the program and forged a high-powered alliance in the process. Elaine Wittenberg, PhD, is the author of more than 150 peer-reviewed articles on hospice and palliative care communication and coauthor of seven books pertaining to palliative care, family communication, and nursing. Ms. Ramkissoon also had critical support and guidance throughout her project from Aliza Ben-Zacharia, DNP, PhD, ANP-BC, an accomplished nurse practitioner in Mount Sinai Neurology.

Following their remarkable collaboration and the success of their QI project, the three are working on a manuscript they hope to publish in a peer-reviewed journal.

“These are nursing research giants, in my eyes,” Ms. Ramkissoon says. “The generosity of their knowledge, expertise, and experience cannot be overstated. Working with them on such an impactful project, that is so meaningful to me personally, has allowed me to find my own voice in health care.”

Christopher Reyes, BSN, RN

Christopher Reyes, BSN, RN, is the Director of Nursing Quality at Mount Sinai International, a small branch of Mount Sinai that provides international health care consulting. While working as a nurse manager of a Med-Surg unit at Mount Sinai West, he recognized an opportunity to enhance care for patients at risk of decline from sepsis.

“Sepsis is very complicated,” he says. “There are many opportunities for miscommunication that can lead to suboptimal care and poor outcomes. Nurses play a critical role in ensuring high-quality care for these patients, as they are often the first to recognize the subtle and acute changes that are early warning signs of sepsis. If we’re the ones who are going to identify all the gaps, we should also be involved in fixing them.”

Working with the physicians and the nursing staff on his unit, Mr. Reyes created multipronged training, onsite resources, and enhanced protocols to support practice. Chief among them was the introduction of a bedside huddle for patients with sepsis risk, with the goal of improving compliance with a life-saving sepsis protocol called SEP-1. Following the implementation of the huddle, compliance increased and potential barriers to components of the protocol were identified. Likewise, the enhanced approach gives the nurse managers a forum for further improving sepsis response.

“We need to test out these ideas for improvement,” Mr. Reyes says. “We need to look at the evidence and try to apply it and go about it scientifically. It’s the best way nurses can make big

If you have an idea for a nursing research, quality improvement, or evidence-based practice project, please contact the Center for Nursing Research and Innovation (CNRI) at Mount Sinai.

Read the Papers

Virtual Nursing in the Inpatient Setting: Staff Perspectives and Key Insights

Ksenia Gorbenko, Maria Bailon, Jordan Randall, Patrick Healy, Robert Freeman

Improving Cardiac Arrest Response and Minimizing Time Delays in Medical-Surgical Units

Loriel Lozano, Charles Liu, Andrea Barbosa

Enhancing Nursing Communication in Palliative Care Through the COMFORT Model’s Connect Module

Alyssa Ramkissoon

The Impact of Enhanced Orientation Skills Sessions on New Graduate Nurses Practicing at an Acute Care Hospital

Melinda Ramroop

Piloting an Inpatient Huddle to Improve Compliance with the Severe Sepsis and Septic Shock Early Management Bundle (SEP-1)

Christopher Reyes

Enhancing Pupillary Assessment Among Critical Care Patients

Elvira Solis, Andrea Barbosa, Geneline Barayuga

 

 

 

 

 

Celebrating Nurse Practitioners: A Critical Role in Health Care

Nov 6, 2025 | Featured, Nursing

Nurse Practitioners (NPs) play an increasingly important role in the fast-paced and high-reliability field of health care. Since the nation’s first NP program launched in 1965, there are now more than 431,000 licensed NPs throughout the United States, responsible for nearly 1 billion patient visits annually. These are clinically trained health professionals who have journeyed a rigorous professional development path, earning graduate-level degrees and completing exacting board certification requirements. Their shared goal: to provide better care for their patients and advance practice.

In recognition of National Nurse Practitioner Week, November 9-15, Nurse Practitioners from throughout the Mount Sinai Health System talked about their own experiences.

 

Genevieve McHugh, FNP-C, RN-BC, PCCN, works in an inpatient cardiology service within Mount Sinai Fuster Heart Hospital. There, 38 nurse practitioners are responsible for diagnosing, managing and treating, admitting, and discharging complex cardiac patients in collaboration with the physicians.

“When I started as a nurse, I didn’t know the tremendous role NPs play in health care,” Ms. McHugh says. “I worked on a Mount Sinai cardiac step-down unit with a talented and caring group of NPs. They were reviewing patient labs, data, and vitals, rounding with the attending, fellows, and residents, participating in interdisciplinary rounds, and discharging patients. And they absolutely influenced my decision to pursue advanced practice nursing.”

Yehwon Lee, DNP, MS, FNP-BC, specializes in thoracic medical oncology at The Blavatnik Family Chelsea Medical Center.

“Nurses and nurse practitioners play invaluable roles delivering patient care that requires continued learning and improving expertise,” Dr. Lee says. “The more I learned about oncology nursing, the more I wanted to expand my scope of practice and have a bigger influence on patients who are going through cancer diagnoses.” She now cares for patients along the spectrum of work-ups for diagnoses, receiving treatments, continuing surveillance, and survivorship.

Deborah Louis, PMHNP-BC, practices in the 36-bed Psychiatry Inpatient Unit at Mount Sinai South Nassau. Having spent 12 years as an RN Supervisor at a traumatic brain injury facility before becoming a psychiatric mental health NP, she had an opportunity to see a different side of mental health.

“Many of the patients struggled with depression, anger, and intense emotions because of their injuries, but too often, no one truly listened to them. Becoming a psychiatric mental health NP allowed me to take my advocacy for y patients even further, not only to listen but to help create meaningful change.”

Similarly, a focus on clinical expertise and advocacy defines the practice of Michael Olivier-De La Torre, DNP, FNP-BC, Mount Sinai West, Institute for Advanced Medicine-Samuels Clinic. He began his career in community health, supporting patients living with HIV and chronic illnesses. Dr. Olivier-De La Torre quickly realized how much trust, empathy, and advocacy matter in health care, particularly in giving voice and care to those who face stigma and barriers to health.

“I pursued advanced practice nursing because I wanted to expand my ability to advocate for patients and deliver comprehensive, evidence-based care,” he says. “Becoming an NP, and then earning my Doctor of Nursing Practice the following year, allowed me to step into the role of a primary care provider who could manage acute conditions, chronic disease, and preventive care all at once. And it allows me to advance not just individual care, but community health.”

Some Mount Sinai NPs started out on a less conventional path. In her mid-twenties, Randi Adelman, PMHNP-BC planned to be a sportswriter. After reading about nursing in a book about career choices, something clicked. She earned a second-degree Bachelor of Science in Nursing and later studied to become an NP in psychiatric mental health. She currently works as a team leader in the Comprehensive Adolescent Rehabilitation and Education Service (CARES), a partnership between the Mount Sinai Department of Psychiatry, the Addiction Institute of Mount Sinai, and the New York Department of Education that provides critical mental health and substance treatments to New York City’s most vulnerable teens.

“I chose to become an NP because I wanted more responsibility, more autonomy, and specialized knowledge in my field,” says Ms. Adelman. She is now responsible for providing psychiatric and medication management services to about half of the CARES patients, in addition to leading group therapy sessions and providing individual and milieu therapy. “It’s exciting to be in a position where I can make a real impact in the lives of my patients and at such a critical time in their lives.”

Stephane Geneus, MSN, AGPCNP-BC, an NP working with gynecologic medical oncology patients at The Blavatnik Family Chelsea Medical Center, echoes these sentiments.

“As an NP, I have the ability to make a meaningful impact on individuals and communities as part of an interdisciplinary team of oncologists, radiologists, social workers, dieticians, and many others,” she says. “Our goal is not only to treat illness but to empower patients through education and support, so they feel more in control of their health.”

Erica Valenski, MSN, RN, AGPCNP-BC, GERO-BC, WCC, a nurse practitioner specializing in geriatrics at Mount Sinai South Nassau, also demonstrates the NP’s ability to extend their influence beyond the point of care. “I’m building my nursing career on Long Island—where I was born, raised, and now care for the neighbors and older adults who shaped my community,” she says.

Passionate about expanding age-friendly initiatives, Ms. Valenski has collaborated across disciplines in efforts to educate staff, enhance end-of-life care, and lead various hospital improvement initiatives to ensure age-friendly, person-centered care is woven into daily practice. She recently led a research project on falls, ageism, and high-risk medications in the Emergency Department that her team is writing up for publication.

 

Because NPs have an opportunity to build stronger relationships with patients over time, they are ideally positioned to promote personalized care for their own patients and more broadly. “In my current role in general and bariatric surgery,” says Etella Veyg, ANP-BC, Clinical Program Manager, Surgery, Mount Sinai Brooklyn.

“I’m able use my experiences and knowledge to guide patients through the challenges and rewards of weight loss and help them achieve both physical and emotional well-being. As a clinical program manager, I can combine my leadership and clinical expertise to oversee projects and programs on a larger scale, to have a more strategic impact beyond direct patient care.”

Minna Park, DNP, FNP-C, ACHPN, works at Mount Sinai Queens in the Department of Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine. Early in her career, an opportunity to be a wound care champion deepened her clinical knowledge, strengthened her sense of autonomy, and inspired her to pursue advanced practice nursing. She became a family nurse practitioner and then completed an adult palliative and end-of-life care fellowship during her doctoral program. Today she cares for people facing serious illness.

“We help manage severe symptoms,” Dr. Park says, “but my role also involves listening to patients’ concerns, validating their struggles, exploring available resources, advocating for their needs, and creating care plans together that reflect their values and goals. My goal is to support patients, caregivers, and the medical team throughout the course of an illness. Although I may be involved with a patient for only a short time, I know the care I provide can significantly influence the last chapter of their life. Through palliative care, I help empower people to plan their lives and have greater control even in the face of uncertainty.”

Helping patients feel more confident and knowledgeable about their health is especially important in the management of diabetes.

Abigail Tamru, DNP, NP-C, works at The Mount Sinai Hospital in the Department of Endocrinology as part of the inpatient diabetes management consulting service. She also sees patients in the hospital’s outpatient High A1C Clinic once a week.

“I’m especially passionate about reducing readmissions and supporting patient self-management through education and follow-up,” Dr. Tamru says. “I was drawn to nursing because it combines science, problem-solving, and the ability to make a meaningful difference in people’s lives. Becoming an NP allowed me to deepen my knowledge and expand my impact on patient care.”

In virtually every specialty area and in all environments of care throughout the Health System, Nurse Practitioners play a vital role in health care delivery and direction. Every day and with every encounter they make a difference in the lives of patients who are often at their most vulnerable. They are health care superstars. To learn more about advanced practice nursing at Mount Sinai, click here.

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