1. Loretta Cecelia Ford was an American nurse and the co-founder of the first nurse practitioner program.
17 Facts About Loretta Ford
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In 1972, Loretta Ford joined the University of Rochester as founding dean of their nursing school.
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Loretta Ford Pfingstel was born in New York City on December 28,1920.
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When Loretta Ford graduated from high school at 16, she was too young to enter a postgraduate training program, so she worked at Middlesex General Hospital in New Brunswick, New Jersey, as a nurses' aide.
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In 1942, following the death of her fiance in World War II, Loretta Ford joined the United States Army Air Force.
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Loretta Ford had hoped to enter flight nurse training, but was denied due to her vision, and instead served at base hospitals in Florida and Maine.
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At CU, Loretta Ford was mentored and impacted by several influential figures in nursing and public health including Lucile Petry Leone, Pearl Parvin Coulter, and Henrietta Loughran.
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In 1961, Loretta Ford received her Doctorate in Nursing Education from the University of Colorado.
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Loretta Ford became the founding dean of the nursing school at the University of Rochester in 1972 and Director of Clinical Nursing at the university's teaching hospital, the Strong Memorial Hospital.
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At the University of Rochester, Loretta Ford developed the unification model of nursing.
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Loretta Ford was given the opportunity to begin developing the specialized training she envisioned through the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education in Nursing.
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In 1965, Loretta Ford joined with pediatrician Henry Silver to create the pediatric nurse practitioner program at the University of Colorado.
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Additionally, there was a great deal of prejudice around the abilities of nurses that Loretta Ford worked to overcome in these first nurse practitioner programs.
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Loretta Ford turned 100 in December 2020, and died in Wildwood, Florida on January 22,2025, at the age of 104.
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In 1989, Ford received the Ruth B Freeman Award in the Public Health Nursing Section from the American Public Health Association.
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Loretta Ford was named a Living Legend by the American Academy of Nursing in 1999.
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In 2020, Loretta Ford received the US Surgeon General's Medallion, awarded for exceptional achievements in the cause of public health and medicine.