Professional Affiliation,
Nemours Children’s Health Delaware
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
Taryn Edwards joined NANN before graduating from the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Nursing in 2004. She started as a nurse at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) right after nursing school and found deep satisfaction in the care of critically ill neonates. In 2010, she graduated from the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Nursing with a Master of Science degree and began practicing as a neonatal nurse practitioner for the general, thoracic, and fetal surgery team within the NICU at CHOP. In 2021, Taryn transitioned to full time at Nemours Children’s Health Delaware. She has participated in Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing’s Maternal Child Health Leadership Academy as a leadership fellow in 2008 and as a mentor in 2012. She has served as newsletter editor and President of NANN’s Delaware Valley Chapter, NANN Board of Directors from 2015-2019 as a Director-at-large, and NANN-AP Council from 2019-2023 as a council member. Her professional interests include the surgical neonate, human milk and breastfeeding, and the environmental impacts on maternal-child health.

Professional Affiliation,
Children’s National Hospital in Washington, DC
Dr. Snapp is a neonatal nurse practitioner and member of the Children’s National in Washington, DC, NICU team working in Virginia and is also an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Dr. Snapp serves on several boards in the metropolitan DC area including the steering committee for the state collaborative. She is often involved in multiple activities on the national level as well. Dr. Snapp has had a career-long interest in neonatal resuscitation both as instructor and author. She has served NANN in many capacities for over the last 30 years and has authored several publications. Dr. Snapp enjoys creating new research projects and mentoring new nurses and NPs.

Professional Affiliation,
Director, Neonatal Network Nationwide Children’s, Columbus OH

Melissa Hamms graduated with a baccalaureate degree from the University of Cincinnati College of Nursing and within 6 months transferred from Women’s Health into the Newborn Intensive Care Unit. She found her passion and began her career journey to improve care in the newborn intensive care department. She has spent her 30+ years as a bedside nurse, nurse manager and is currently a Director of the Neonatal Network at Nationwide Children’s. She graduated in 2001 from Franklin University with a master’s degree in business (with a healthcare focus). She has been actively involved in NANN and was a founding member and president of the Central Ohio Association of NANN. Her passions beyond creating the best care practices for neonates include mentoring new leaders and program development.

Professional Affiliation,
Wayne State University, College of Nursing
Leanne Nantais-Smith is Associate Clinical Professor and Director of Advanced Practice and Graduate Certificate Programs at Wayne State University (WSU) College of Nursing (CON) in Detroit, Michigan. She is also a certified Neonatal Nurse Practitioner (NNP) and Coordinator of the NNP Specialty. Leanne completed a Master of Science in Nursing with NNP specialty in 1989 and Doctor of Philosophy in 1997, both from WSU. Leanne is a member of multiple organizations, including NANN/NANN-AP, Sigma Theta Tau, American Association of Nurse Practitioners , and the National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties (NONPF). She was inducted as a Fellow of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) in June 2022. She has multiple presentations (peer-reviewed and invited) and publications in advanced practice neonatal topics and has worked on several HRSA Advanced Nursing Education Workforce grants to expand the APRN workforce. She is currently a co-investigator on a HRSA ANEW ($2.6m) grant related to investigating new models of APRN primary care clinical education. Her educational interests focus on NNP clinical education and mentoring doctoral students with implementation of quality improvement initiatives. Her research interest focuses on identifying noninvasive biomarkers of necrotizing enterocolitis.

Professional Affiliations,
Texas Children’s Hospital – The Woodlands,
UTMB School of Nursing
Heidi Thompson began her neonatal nursing career as a new graduate in the ISCU at UTMB and spent more than a decade at the bedside in a tertiary Level IV NICU, caring for critically ill infants and mentoring new nurses. Since 2015, she has served as a nurse leader across NICU, Acute Care Pediatrics, Pediatric Heart Center, and PICU. She is currently serving as an Assistant Clinical Director at Texas Children’s Hospital – The Woodlands, overseeing three critical care departments. Her leadership has advanced outcomes by reducing NICU turnover from 38% to under 10%, decreasing central line infections in the ELBW population by over 60%, and strengthening RN–RN-provider relationships. Heidi was honored to be selected for NANN’s 2018–2019 Emerging Leader Fellowship, which deepened her passion for leadership and professional development. She also serves as adjunct faculty for the UTMB School of Nursing and has contributed to NANN through the Professional Development and ONENANN Committees. Her professional interests include nurse retention, family-centered care, and mentoring the next generation of neonatal nurses.

Dr. Kathryn (Katie) Malin-Riepenhoff,
Katie Malin is an Associate Professor in the College of Nursing at Marquette University and a Neonatal Nurse Practitioner at Children’s Wisconsin. Her research focuses on maternal–infant health equity, particularly how social determinants of health, toxic stress, and early adversity shape epigenetic outcomes in preterm infants. She is currently funded by an NIH K23 award, Preterm Infants, Moms, and the Social Determinants of Health: an Epigenetic Investigation (PRIMS-EI), which examines the relationships between maternal and infant stress, DNA methylation, and developmental health trajectories in preterm infants.

In addition to her research, Dr. Malin is an active clinician, educator, and mentor. She has extensive experience teaching evidence-based practice, research methods, and neonatal nursing at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. She has published and presented nationally on neonatal stress, social determinants of health, and nursing workforce issues.

Katie has been a member of the National Association of Neonatal Nurses (NANN) since 2001 and is a founding member of the State of Wisconsin Association of Neonatal Nurses. She is deeply grateful for the opportunity to serve and support NICU health professionals across the country.

Professional Affiliation,
Advocate Aurora
Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin

Meghan Luh has been practicing as a neonatal nurse practitioner since 2009.  She is currently the lead neonatal nurse practitioner at Advocate Aurora Medical Center in Summit, WI, and is also a member of the neonatal nurse practitioner team at Children’s Wisconsin in Milwaukee.  She completed her bachelor’s degree in nursing at Marquette University and subsequently obtained her master’s degree in nursing from the University of Florida. Meghan has served NANN in many roles, notably as a board member for the State of Wisconsin Association of Neonatal Nurses in addition to being a member of the NANN Awards Selection Task Force Committee and a NANN Annual Conference Abstract Reviewer. Most recently, she was honored to serve a two year term as a NANN Director-at-Large and is enthusiastically looking forward to a second term. Meghan is passionate about leadership and obtained ANCC certification as a nurse executive. In addition, she is a certified lactation consultant. Meghan’s areas of professional interest include care of the late preterm infant, promotion of breastfeeding, and nurse leadership.

Professional Affiliation,
California State University, Dominguez Hills

Andrea C Morris started in the NICU as a new graduate nurse in 1985 at the Children’s Hospital of New Mexico. She joined NANN and the Association of Critical Care Nurse in the late 80’s and earned her certifications in the late 80’s(RNC-NIC, NIDCAP) and early 90’s (CCRN). She served in a variety of roles from bedside care to charge nurse while working night shift for 11 years. Those various roles ranged from delivery attendance to ECMO pump specialist (including ECMO on adults during the Hanta virus outbreak in NM). She completed her MSN at the University of NM in 1995 in the Clinical Nurse Specialist track and moved to California in 1996. While in California she worked for several NICUs. At the primary NICU where she spent 20 years she was able to develop educational programs, simulation teams, transport teams, integrate 2 separate NICUs into one, open a new NICU, and mentor 10’s of CNS students through the years. In collaboration with University of Irvine Medical Center and Huntington Hospital CNS’s they developed a NICU training program and opened it to all facilities in the Orange and Los Angeles Counties. She was also able to consult and speak around the country and at local and national conferences on a variety of topics, a main love being developmental care. She received her DNP in 2012 from Western University of Health Sciences and was able to use many of the projects to improve care in the NICU. Andrea volunteered with NANN and also local chapters through the years in a variety of roles. She was honored to be a Sigma Theta Tau Maternal Child Health Leadership mentor in 2006-2007. In 2020 Andrea started teaching in the NICU CNS MSN program at California State University: Dominguez Hills. She retired from clinical work in 2021 and continues teaching part time for CSUDH in the NICU CNS program, helping to prepare the next generation of NICU CNS’s along with their preceptors.

Elizabeth graduated with her BSN from Texas Woman’s University in 2011 and her MSN from the University of Texas at Arlington in 2017. She is a Clinical Nurse at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford in California. Elizabeth participated in NANN’s inaugural Emerging Leader Program in 2017. She was a member of NANN’s Membership Committee and Annual Conference Committee as well as served as president of the North Texas and Northern California chapters. Elizabeth obtained her certifications from NCC for NIC, ELBW & NNIC and currently volunteers on the NNIC Content Team. Her professional interests are cardiac, therapeutic hypothermia and precepting new graduate nurses.

Professional Affiliation,
Augusta University, Georgia

Sherri started her nursing career at the Medical College of Georgia Hospital and Clinics, now WellStar MCG Health/Children’s Hospital of Georgia, in the well-baby nursery in 1986, following in her mother’s footsteps as a baby nurse. She then transferred to the NICU in 1990 for bigger and better endeavors. Over the course of 30+years in the same NICU, a Level IV NICU, Sherri has seen first-hand how the world of neonatal nursing has changed and advanced. Sherri has been a member of NANN since 2010 and has enjoyed the opportunities of being a local president and volunteering on the local and national levels. Her goal is to be a mentor for young NICU nurses to become passionate about their work and to BE INTENTIONAL!