EHN 2022AnnualReport 9DIGITAL - Flipbook - Page 16
Heather Sellers, a compassionate,
thoughtful leader
Heather Sellers, MPH, RN, CPH, CHES®
celebrated her second anniversary with EHN in 2022.
When people are out on leave, when EHN is in the
process of replacing important roles, Heather is the
first to step in and take on additional jobs. At a small,
evolving organization like EHN, an attitude like this is
not unusual. All EHN employees wear multiple hats
and pitch in wherever they are needed. But no one
does this more so than Heather.
Explaining her desire to help the team, Heather
says, “Coming from military background, you have
to just do what you do to get the job done.”
Indeed, Heather joined EHN after a 20-year
career as an officer in the U.S. Navy Nurse Corps.
She retired at the rank of Commander or O-5.
Heather deployed for Pacific Partnership 2015, a
humanitarian mission, during which she traveled
to remote sites as the lead nurse for the advanced
on-site and pre-deployment site survey team.
“It was actually a lot of fun,” she says. One such
mission was in Tarawa, Kiribati, which Heather
describes as being a beautiful atoll but quite
literally in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
Heather has used her military background to
bring process and systemization to EHN, which
is incredibly valuable at a young and growing
organization. EHN Ambulatory Care Manager Riaz
Kanji says, “Heather is a compassionate, thoughtful
leader with the right mix of analytics and
healthcare knowledge in her everyday approach.”
Heather is also a great
mentor to upcoming
leaders within EHN.
“Heather helped build
out structure. She helped
build out the team. She helped
everyone grow in their space. I love working with
Heather. I’ve learned so much working under her.
I couldn’t ask for a better director,” says Christine
McClurg, Quality Supervisor.
Never one to shy away from adventure, Heather
continues to seek new experiences. Next fall,
Heather will start the Doctorate in Public Health
(DrPH) program at the Medical College of Wisconsin.
She is interested in furthering her ability to apply
data to understand our Eastside population and
address health issues in our community. Heather
has also recently been appointed to the Snohomish
County Public Health Advisory Council. Both
projects will help better understand the health
needs of the population we serve.
One area in which Heather would like to focus in
2023 is EHN’s utilization numbers. “A lot of what
care management focuses on is patients who are
over- or under-utilizing care…or inappropriately
utilizing, care, for example, seeking care at the
emergency department instead of through primary
care,” she says.
Heather is a crucial driver of the strategic vision
for EHN. Her desire to help the team, develop new
leaders, and maximize the health of our community
will undoubtedly help us reach better health
outcomes in the years to come.
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EASTSIDE HEALTH NETWORK