White House AIDS official discusses care

What is the place of professional nursing in the field of the HIV/AIDS epidemic? How does the nurse bridge the emotional gap between the physician and the patient? How can national health care turn traditional nurse practitioners into community caregivers? These questions and more were addressed last night when Kristine Gebbie spoke to an audience of approximately 100 in the Nursing Education Building. Gebbie, recently appointed by President Clinton as White House National AIDS Policy Coordinator, drew a crowd of fellow professionals, students, patients and interested community members. Her speech, which lasted for nearly an hour, focused on the role of the nurse in the caretaking of the HIV/AIDS-infected patient, as well as in the prevention of the epidemic. Gebbie said that a physician can only care for a patient to a certain extent, and that nurses often take that care farther with more personal, emotionally-stabilizing care. She also spoke on the relation of the disease to the present state of American health care. "The epidemic gives us a lens on problems of our health-illness system, the problems of our finance system and the problems of our social system," said Gebbie. "And in each case, we are enabled to see flaws, but also to see opportunities and strengths that we don't very often see." After holding various positions in nursing and health care – including assistant director of health in Oregon, secretary of the Washington state Department of Health and coordinator of ambulatory care at St. Louis University – Gebbie was appointed to the White House position last summer. In describing her position, Gebbie said, "It's not only that we get the biggest bang we can for every federal dollar we get ? but also that we weave together the public and private sectors in a single, national response to the epidemic." Gebbie also pointed out the distinct need to rid the nation of its denial of the HIV and AIDS problem. "We'll really go to work on this as a community-wide problem," she said. The dilemma of funding was also brought up both during the speech as well as during a question and answer session afterwards. Suzanne Langder, author of an HIV early intervention program, raised the question of unequal funding in different areas, specifically between a well-backed city such as New York and Philadelphia, which she said is quite lacking in money for primary care.