Since graduating as part of the College of Nursing’s second class in October 2008, Brooke Tom has fulfilled her childhood dream to be a nurse. Today, she is an emergency/trauma nurse in the Emergency Room at St. Rose Dominican Hospital’s Siena campus in Henderson.

“Growing up I always wanted to be a nurse,” said Tom. “I had a few aunts who were nurses and I was always fascinated with the human body.”

The Morganton, North Carolina native has channeled her passion for nursing and has successfully applied it on the job. After serving nearly one year as a nurse, Tom has received certifications in advanced cardiac life support, pediatric advanced life support and trauma nursing care.

Tom was also recently asked to join the Unit Team Council, a group of St. Rose Hospital employees working to achieve Magnet status, an award given by the American Nurses’ Credentialing Center (ANCC), an affiliate of the American Nurses Association, to hospitals that satisfy a set of criteria designed to measure the strength and quality of their nursing.

A Magnet hospital is stated to be one where nurses deliver excellent patient outcomes, have a high level of job satisfaction, a low turnover rate and appropriate grievance resolution.  “Magnet status is the highest credential a hospital can achieve in the area of nursing,” said Tom. “We’re working hard to set a new standard in Southern Nevada.”

When she’s not working, Tom devotes herself to her 11-year-old daughter and fixing up the new home she and her husband “Moose” recently purchased in the Sunrise Mountain area of Las Vegas.

Getting her house together takes a lot of her spare time, leaving little room for hobbies, says Tom. However, she does have one hobby that hasn’t faltered – the collection of casino memorabilia. “I have a billiard room filled with slot machines, casino tokens, ash trays and other items I’ve collected through the years,” said Tom.

Even with her busy schedule, Tom is already looking forward to furthering her education by entering a Family Nurse Practitioner program next year.

“I love the action as a nurse,” said Tom. “Sometimes it gets the adrenaline pumping.”

MBA PROGRAM

Suken Shah

USN alumnus Suken Shah has come a long way since he began his career in media as an unpaid intern/producer on the Tom and Nicole Morning show on Sunny 106.5 FM in Las Vegas.  After his two-year stint with the m

orning show, Shah moved into the sales and marketing arena with Cox Media. While there, he helped put toget

her many different interactive marketing promotions that helped drive ratings and revenue.

In 2005, Shah entered into the Master of Business Administration (MBA) program at USN because he realized that in order to be successful in today’s business world he would need further education. Shah was a charter member of the newly formed weekend MBA program and attended classes while maintaining his full-time position at Cox Media. He also served as an active officer in USN’s Student Governance Association and graduated in 2007.

According to Shah, his time at USN helped him receive a solid education in business and gain a better grasp of how business works, helping him achieve a high level of success in all of his endeavors.

“I am grateful to have had the opportunity to work while I was attending school. In some cases I was able to take what I had learned on Saturday afternoon and put it to work on Monday morning when I got into the office.  Managing school, work and a personal life was a challenge but in the end it was worth it,” said Shah.

Due to his hard work and passion for marketing, Shah has since moved up to the position of product specialist at Cox Media.  He is responsible for the successful launch of GoScout HOMES on Cox Digital Cable. He generated more than $200,000 in revenue along with creating marketing campaigns to help promote the channel. Shah also works to help promote Video-On-Demand, Interactive Advertising, and SMS Advertising to local businesses. In essence, he helps businesses use new technology to better their bottom lines.

Inspired by his experiences at USN, Shah has become an adjunct professor at UNLV, helping a new generation of students gain the tools they need in order to make a strong impact in the marketing world. He has taught a course in creating and giving effective presentations and is currently teaching Internet Marketing for the College of Business.  He has a deep passion for education and loves to teach others on how technology is helping make life and business better.

“I discovered that education doesn’t end with graduation,” said Shah. “Teaching has been one of the most rewarding experiences of m

y life.”

Additionally, Shah has been a guest speaker for the Clark County School District’s PAYBAC (Professionals and Youth Building a Commitment) program, which sends business professionals to at-risk schools to educate students about the importance of staying in school. He also participates in Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology Small Business Expo where he speaks on how businesses can use the Internet in many different ways to reach their target audiences.
 
In his free time, Shah enjoys giving back to his community by volunteering for the Tiger Woods Foundation, Olive Crest and 

The Salvation Army.
 
In 2005, Shah won a national Adoption Excellence Award from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for his work with the A Welcome Home program.  A Welcome Home has helped bring awareness to a high number of children in Clark County who are in need of loving families.
 
He also serves as communications chair for the American Advertising Federation of Las Vegas.
 
Even with his hectic schedule Shah still maintains close ties to USN.
 
“I appreciate the whole USN faculty and staff and everything they’ve done for me. They’ve truly given me the real-world experience which is so vital to my industry. I enjoy keeping in contact with my former professors and going out to lunch to catch-up on what’s new with the university and how I can help out,” remarks Shah.  

COLLEGE OF PHARMACY

Felipe Contreras and Christopher Tyler

USN 2005 College

of Pharmacy graduates Felipe Contreras and Christopher Tyler, have not only used their degrees to further their professional careers as licensed pharmacists, they have also used the skills they learned at the university to provide healthcare services to Southern Nevada, particularly the Hispanic community.

In September of 2007, Contreras and Tyler, both Honors graduates, started a new business venture - Farmacia Del Pueblo, located at 2123 Civic Center Drive in North Las Vegas. They serve as co-owners and pharmacists at the pharmacy which caters to the diverse needs of the Hispanic community by offering bilingual (Spanish and English) pharmacy services and products, including over-the-counter medications, supplements, diabetic testing supplies and custom compounding in their state-of-the-art laboratory.

Compounding is a special skill learned by pharmacists in order to help them create medications tailored to the specific needs of both the prescriber and patient. Compounding is an integral part of the USN College of Pharmacy curriculum as it gives future practitioners the expertise to work out complex health problems and provide optimum patient care.

Some of the compounding services Farmacia Del Pueblo offers are customized dosing - patient-specific and individualized to meet any dosing problems (varying strengths, sizes, and dosage forms), dye-free, preservative free, and alcohol-free formulations and custom flavoring to help make certain medications easier to administer (i.e. veterinary and pediatric flavoring).

Through their business, the pharmacy has been making positive strides in the community by participating in health fairs, where they provide free blood pressure screenings and pertinent information on diabetes, which has a high prevalence amongst Hispanics. According to Tyler, one of their ultimate goals is to eventually start an immunization clinic.

Contreras says one of the benefits of their business is being able to provide Spanish language consults for the Latino community. He estimates that they’ve filled over 7,000 prescriptions for their patients since opening the doors in September.

Contreras, who is originally from Mexico moved to the United States when he was 14, and is proud to support the local Latino community. Pri

or to entering pharmacy school, he served four years in the U.S. Navy as a hospital corpsman where he was stationed in Virginia aboard the USS Enterprise. This initial exposure to the health care industry helped lead him to realize his dream to become a pharmacist.

Contreras enjoys riding his bike and watching action, drama and suspense movies. He is grateful for the education he received from USN, especially the block-curriculum teaching method, his involvement with the Kappa Psi pharmacy fraternity and clinical rotations.

Tyler, who is also fluent is Spanish, learned 

the language through a combination of taking classes and living abroad in Bogota, Columbia for two years as a part of a foreign service trip. His trip gave him both insight and a surge of respect for the Latino culture.

When Tyler is not working, which he said is “very rarely,” he enjoys spending time with his wife of seven years Marta, and his two dogs, a Pomeranian named Bear and a Chihuahua named Buddy. He also likes to go to the movies and work on projects around the house.

Among his favorite memories stemming from his time at USN are: His graduation, clinical rotations, and working with his fellow students and preceptors (a professor or local pharmacists who serves in a mentoring role).

Tyler believes USN plays a crucial role in health and wellness in Southern Nevada because it “brings a lot of talented young people to the area and creates healthcare professionals who come out of school and contribute positively to the community.”