My goal for DNP studies at XXXX University is to be the finest DNP possible. I am an RN in a psychiatric unit working with patients in acute crisis. Raised in a family of humanistic and holistic healers, the daughter of a nurse educator and the sister of a nurse-midwife—my father, a dentist, also inspired me to focus on the underserved. I have witnessed the fulfillment that accompanies a career in health care. I have learned a great deal about healing as a nursing professional and volunteer and as a patient battling depression and an eating disorder as an adolescent and young adult. Successfully overcoming my battle against depression and related eating disorders also helps explain my dedication to the cause of psychiatric nursing.
Along with my entire family, I have been heavily involved with the Haitian Health Foundation (HHF) for many years, and I have personally had the privilege of going on three mission trips for two weeks each. My experiences in Haiti represent some of the highest moments of my life, the part of my professional existence that provides me with the most meaning and satisfaction. My fondest dream as a volunteer is advancing the cause of mental health nursing in Haiti, a goal rooted in my first trip to Haiti as a high school student in 1996. I helped inform expectant mothers and assisted nurses and doctors with prenatal care. I traveled to remote villages to help dentists as they extracted decaying teeth from hundreds of patients, holding patients’ hands and reassuring them. Here at home, I have also volunteered at the XXXX House, which provides HIV-supportive services to encourage and empower. I helped to prepare meals and educate patients about medication, co-morbidities, self-care, and providing a listening ear.
I hope to complete my Capstone Project in crisis intervention and acute care stabilization. While I am confident that the distinguished faculty at XXXX University will help me significantly refine my ideas, I hope to develop an additional focus on the effectiveness of trained peer mentors as members of treatment teams. I hope to shed light on how peer mentors help patients recover sustainably. This line of inquiry is motivated by my suspicion that trained peer mentors often play helpful, if not vital, roles in recovery over the long term.
I hope to spend many decades to come giving my all to my patients in a residential facility or outpatient clinic in which I can work closely with patients with mental illness and care for them long enough to make significant contributions to their successful stabilization, physically and emotionally, along with subsequent recovery for many. I live to help patients develop tools for healing, avoiding recidivism, patience, honesty, and accountability. I enjoy the challenge of our field, its complexity, and how the DNP professional must depend upon various disciplines to provide optimal care for her patients, including but not limited to counseling/psychotherapy, psychopharmacology, behavior modification, and health maintenance.
I believe that I have now developed excellent communication skills, practiced patience, and care capacity that will enable me to distinguish myself as a DNP professional. I know with certainty that once I receive the necessary education, I will run with it as far as I can and find the noblest form of satisfaction and contentment in helping people learn how to stop suffering. I can imagine no higher form of compensation.
I thank you for considering my application to your program.