Owens Concludes 45-Year Career at the Hospital
Posted on Sunday, January 12th, 2025
Retiring after 45 Years: Patricia Owens, ARNP-CPN, family nurse practitioner, embraces several clinic colleagues at Mercy Health Love County in Marietta on her retirement day, December 31, 2024. (Front row) Kellie Westra, LPN; Owens; Misty McGee, LPN; Misti Kirk, Clinic Director; and Jana Brown, Business Office Coordinator. (Back row) Patient Representatives Noemi Carrasco, Christy Morehead, and Sherry Diaz. (Photo by Barbara Sessions)
Nurse Practitioner Concludes 45-Year Career in Marietta
Patricia Owens, a beloved family nurse practitioner at Mercy Health Love County, wrapped up an incomparable 45-year career with the Marietta health center on December 31.
“It’s time,” said Owens, age 67, who thrived on her long-term relationships with patients and staff. They thrived, too.
“She was booked to the very last minute,” said Clinic Director, Misti Kirk. In my 33 years here, Pat was always fully booked. Everyone loved her. Her influence ran to several generations. My grandmother was her patient, so was my mother, me, and my twin sons, who are now age 18.”
Added Dr. Stacy Goode, M.D.: “I will miss Pat as a colleague, but she was my medical provider, too. She is brilliant and kind.”
Angie Lang, Medical Records Director with 36 years of experience, once transcribed Owens’ medical dictation. “Pat has an outstanding bedside manner. She is compassionate and brings an intense focus to the patient’s care.”
Owens loves her profession, and she gave back to it every year by volunteering as a clinical “preceptor” to registered nurses studying to become family nurse practitioners. LaDonna Culp of Tishomingo said her rotation through family practice with Owens in 2016 redirected her thinking about a future career.
“Before going there, I didn’t see family practice in my future,” Culp said. “In 23 years as a nurse, I had only emergency room, hospital, and medical/surgical experience. But my 80 hours of practicum with Pat, watching her with her patients, caused me to believe I can make the most impact in family practice. She showed me how you can piece together the whole picture of the patient to help them obtain optimum health.”
Owens said the attraction of mentoring was being able to learn from her students. “I learn from teaching. I learn from the questions they ask. Many of them come here as seasoned nurses and knowing so much. They help me in my practice, because by the end of their practicum, they have advanced from student to peer.”
A current family nurse practitioner in the clinic is one of those former students, Nikki Barker.
Owens herself was mentored by the first nurse practitioner at the hospital, Sharon Hall. Hall joined the emergency room in 1979 after graduating with the second class of nurse practitioners in Oklahoma. After serving in clinics and Health Departments around the area, Hall, of Falconhead, also retired in 2024.
With the encouragement of the hospital, Owens helped southern Oklahoma in other ways. She trained as a pediatric sexual abuse nurse examiner and was called on by the Child Advocacy Center in Ardmore to perform medical examinations of victims of child abuse.
After earning bachelor’s and master’ degrees in nursing and a two-year post-graduate certification in nursing education, Owens was recognized by the University of Oklahoma’s College of Nursing in 2007 for academic achievement and service to the profession.
Not bad for a high school dropout. But that is when, in 1974, her mother, Helen Christner, stepped forward with the best professional guidance Pat said she would receive.
“I dropped out of Wilson at age 16 and went to work as a nursing home aide. My mother was an RN, so I’ve always been influenced to be part of the medical field. Mom said nurse’s aide would give me the best chance of finding out whether nursing was truly a calling for me or just a job. I made $2 an hour or $2.10 on the night shift.”
Her mom took an RN position at the new hospital in Marietta (opened in 1972) and Pat later joined her. Starting as an ambulance medic and nurse’s aide in 1979, Owens rose to become a hospital RN, then the Director of Nursing, then, for the past 30 years, a provider in the clinic, seeing 15-20 patients a day for their primary medical needs.
She worked fulltime when going to school and was assisted by scholarships from the Love County Health Center Foundation.
Owens said she was privileged to be employed with long-term leaders like Dr. Vergil Smith, Dr. Tom O’Connor and Richard Barker, who guided Mercy Health Love County to prominence as a community hospital. “I could order and get back laboratory reports and radiation scans faster here than many of my colleagues in larger towns. We were well-equipped and well-staffed.”
“This place has been like a family to me. The community supports us. This feels like home to me,” she said.
Yet, after 45 years, she admits, “Nursing is hard. There is lots of worry. Did I miss something?” She stayed on through the tough years of COVID-19 and after a tornado struck and disabled the hospital.
Owens has stayed fit through hobbies like swimming and rowing and said she looks forward to pursuing other interests. These include time with her husband Mike, a business owner, and son Ryan, a 2002 graduate of Marietta High, who is now an attorney in Bethany.