RIP Susan Jones: A congenital heart disease patient who beat the odds and became a cardiac nurse

Susan E. Jones, RN

Ed Blazina of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette wrote an obituary for Susan Jones.

For Susan E. Jones, the best way to deal with a congenital heart defect was to become part of the medical community herself.

Mrs. Jones was born with only one ventricle, rather than two, in her heart, leaving her skin blue because her blood wasn’t receiving enough oxygen to carry throughout her body. She had heart surgery a day after her birth and her family was told she probably wouldn’t live very long.

But Mrs. Jones regularly defied the odds for someone with her condition and became a cardiac care nurse, working with the doctors who had cared for her at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh before entering health care administration with insurance providers.

She attended St. Margaret Hospital’s School of Nursing and worked as a nurse in New Jersey for two years before joining the staff at Children’s Hospital to be closer to her regular doctors.
Despite numerous surgeries — including an updated Fontan revision at age 36 — Mrs. Jones built a solid career at Children’s, eventually working to improve the record-keeping system for the cardiac unit. She later moved to Coventry Healthcare and Aetna, where she was a national project manager

Read more about Susan's remarkable journey at:

http://www.post-gazette.com/news/obituaries/2017/02/18/Obituary-Susan-E-Jones-Heart-patient-cardiac-nurse-who-defied-the-odds/stories/201702170095?pgpageversion=pgevoke

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/triblive-tribune-review/obituary.aspx?pid=184125215


RIP Susan!

Donna