MSN, PMHNP-BC, APN , Doctoral (Current)
Melissa Anne Smith, MSN, PMHNP-BC, APN, will complete the Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) program at the University of South Alabama in Mobile, AL in 2023. Her quality improvement project is to implement Mindfulness for Beginners classes for persons experiencing depression and stress-related anxiety in a community-based Partial Hospitalization Program to reduce the incidence and sequalae of depressive and anxious symptoms. Ms. Smith has been a mindfulness practitioner since 2018 and was certified as a Mindfulness Facilitator through the Veteran’s Health Administration CALM Facilitator training in November of 2022.
She serves as a Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurse Practitioner for Veterans experiencing severe mental illness and their families, to improve their overall quality of life while reducing mental health hospitalizations at the James E. VanZant Veterans Affairs Medical Center’s Intensive Community Mental Health Recovery Services Program. As a member of the Veterans Health Administration Office of Nursing Services Mental Health Field Advisory Committee, Ms. Smith collaborates with team members to develop and implement standardized mental health nursing policies, workflows, and documentation across VHA.
She is a member of the American Psychiatric Nurses Association and the American Nurses Association. She is passionate about mentoring, eradicating stigma, and improving care for minorities with mental illness.