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The Ira P. Gunn Award for Outstanding Professional Advocacy was established in 2000 by the AANA membership. It is presented to an individual who, through leadership and/or personal effort, has made a highly significant contribution to the preservation and advancement of the nurse anesthesia profession through legislative, legal and/or regulatory efforts.
The Award was established to honor Ira P. Gunn, CRNA, MLN, FAAN, who had a 21 year Army career, where she excelled as a practitioner, educator, researcher, consultant, and prolific writer. She untiringly devoted her time, knowledge, expertise and energies to the AANA, various State ANAs and individual CRNAs/nurse anesthesiologists confronted with challenges of a legal, legislative or regulatory nature. Her contributions to this profession and its members, through these and other efforts have significantly contributed to the preservation and advancement of the nurse anesthesia profession.
The Award is presented during the AANA Annual Meeting.
The nominee may be a CRNA/nurse anesthesiologists or a non-CRNA who has demonstrated a significant contribution to preserving the continued existence of the profession of nurse anesthesia. The nominee shall have assisted the AANA in overcoming legislative, legal and regulatory challenges to nurse anesthesia practice rights.
Nomination Deadline: March 15
Submit a Nomination: Apply now
For more information, contact Kelly McCohen at kmccohen@aana.com.
The Award was established to honor Ira P. Gunn, CRNA, MLN, FAAN, who had a 21 year Army career, where she excelled as a practitioner, educator, researcher, consultant, and prolific writer. She untiringly devoted her time, knowledge, expertise and energies to the AANA, various State ANAs and individual CRNAs confronted with challenges of a legal, legislative or regulatory nature. Her contributions to this profession and its members, through these and other efforts have significantly contributed to the preservation and advancement of the nurse anesthesia profession.
While Gordon excels as a CRNA and an educator, she shines brightest when advocating for her profession at the local, state, and national levels. She has been an active member of the North Carolina Association of Nurse Anesthetists (NCANA) since 2005 and served numerous roles that helped foster and showcase her passion and knowledge of the political advocacy process.
From 2016 to 2017, she served as NCANA’s president and was instrumental in bringing forth the first pro-CRNA legislation in North Carolina’s history. Later, from 2017 to 2021, she served as NCANA Government Relations Committee Chairperson, where she mobilized previous support to garner over 100 bipartisan supporters for the SAVE Act, which advocated for full practice authority for advanced practice registered nurses (APRNs). According to her nomination, she was notably not content with just advocating for CRNAs, but also sought to uplift all North Carolina nurses, working to modernize the Nursing Practice Act for all four APRN specialties in North Carolina.
Additionally, Gordon serves as a member of the Board of Directors for Health Care Providers for Greater Access and has been directly involved with public education campaigns for the nurse anesthesiologist profession. Furthermore, she is the co-founder of Healing Politics, a nonprofit organization that educates and empowers nurses to enter politics, building a culture of civic engagement within the profession.
In her work to uplift CRNAs, she is said to have a heart of service and has worked tirelessly to mentor her peers and inspire the next generation of CRNAs to advocate for the profession. “By being a relentless worker, others have seen what it takes to be a true advocate for our profession and have taken up the torch.”
A former student of Gordon’s writes, “We all drink from wells that others who came before us dug. Ira P. Gunn was a tremendous digger of wells, and I believe Kimberly Gordon has picked up her shovel and continues to dig for our profession.”
“It is an honor to have my name mentioned in the same breath as Ira Gunn’s,” said Gordon. “It is so vital to protect the CRNA practice: we bring a unique, valuable, and important perspective to healthcare and policymaking—nursing. If we don’t protect our profession, we will lose it. If we don’t tell our story, someone else will. The good news? Nothing is stopping us—we need only decide it is important and choose to do it.”
Beyond her advocacy work, Gordon works per diem as a staff CRNA in Novant Health’s greater Winston-Salem market. She also serves as Adjunct Faculty at both the Wake Forest School of Medicine and Western Carolina University, teaching courses in both policy and advocacy and leadership to doctoral nursing students.
Gordon received her bachelor’s degree in business administration at John Carroll University. After seven years as a cost and budget accountant, she decided to pursue a career in nursing and, eventually, nurse anesthesiology. She earned both her bachelor’s degree and master’s degree in nursing from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and is a proud graduate of the North Carolina Baptist Hospital Nurse Anesthesia Program. In addition, she obtained her Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) from Yale University.
Read Kimberly’s acceptance speech.
Watch Kimberly’s award video.