Mary Alice Vanhoy, MSN, RN, CEN, CPEN, NREMT-P, has been named Nurse Manager for the Queen Anne’s Emergency Center in Grasonville. In this role, she will be responsible for the clinical operation of this 15-bed free-standing emergency center scheduled to open in October.

An emergency nurse for more than 30 years, Vanhoy joined Shore Health System in 1994. For the past 14 years she has been Shore Health System’s Emergency Medical Systems (EMS) Coordinator. In 2006, she took on additional responsibility as the educator for the Emergency Department staff at Memorial Hospital and Dorchester General Hospital. She has also served as Shore Health System’s clinical expert for disaster management.

“Mary Alice has played a significant role in the design of the Queen Anne’s County Emergency Center, which will serve Queen Anne’s and surrounding counties,” says Chris Mitchell, MSN, RN, NEA-BC, Director of Emergency and Outpatient Services, Shore Health System. “Her involvement in major construction projects for the Memorial Hospital and Dorchester General Hospital Emergency Departments and her extensive relationships in the community will serve her well as we expand our services in Queen Anne’s County.”

After completing an associate’s degree in nursing from Forsyth Technical College, Vanhoy earned a bachelor of science degree in chemistry and biology from Guilford College, both in North Carolina. She earned a bachelor’s degree in nursing from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and a master’s degree in nursing education and leadership from the University of Phoenix.

Vanhoy is the EMS captain of the United Communities Volunteer Fire Department in Stevensville and EMS Program Coordinator at Chesapeake College. In 2009, she received the Emergency Nurses Association’s Nursing Professionalism Award. Her other honors include EMS Provider of the Year, the Emergency Nurse of the Year and the EMS for Geriatrics Provider of the Year.

Vanhoy currently represents emergency nurses on the Maryland EMS Board, the Maryland Chapter of the American Trauma Society and the Maryland Pediatric EMS Advisory Committee. She is past president and current president-elect of the Maryland State Council of the Emergency Nurses Association and the secretary/treasurer of the Eastern Shore Chapter of ENA. She currently is an item writer for the newest national emergency nursing certification, Certified Pediatric Emergency Nurse, and serves on the National ENA committee for the Scope of Practice.

An amended version of the emergency room bill is now out of committee and will be heard on the Senate floor. Senate Bill 593, and its companion House Bill 699, would require the state to treat free-standing emergency rooms, like the one being built in Grasonville, the same as emergency rooms attached to hospitals. They would allow ambulances driving patients to those facilities to be reimbursed and require the facilities to be “rate-regulated” by the state’s Health Services Cost Review Commission, which sets how Medicare and other insurers reimburse for treatment at hospitals. Queen Anne’s Commission President Gene Ransom says having a rated facility will prevent the county’s Emergency Medical Services from having to fund deficits at the facility, which are projected to run about $70,000 a month without the legislation.

Delegates in the General Assembly heard testimony on a bill that could have a significant effect on the $15-million Queen Anne’s Emergency Center currently under construction. House Bill 699, if enacted, would require the state to treat freestanding emergency rooms like the one being built in Grasonville the same as emergency rooms attached to hospitals in two important respects. Specifically, the bill would allow ambulances driving patients to those facilities to be reimbursed and would require those facilities to be “rate-regulated,” wherein the state sets how much is reimbursed for a specific treatment.

The bill is co-sponsored by a bipartisan group of delegates, including several from the Eastern Shore and Montgomery County, where another freestanding emergency center is located. The legislation also was submitted in the Maryland Senate. The 15,000-square-foot Queen Anne’s Emergency Center will operate as an around-the-clock emergency room and is located at U.S. 50 and Nesbit Road. Queen Anne’s County currently is only one of two counties in the state that does not have a hospital or emergency facility, the other being Caroline County.