Informational Interview with Jeanie Bowman, MS, NNP

1. Informational
Interview
Jeanie Bowman, MS, NNP

2. Tell me about yourself.
• I am Jeanie Bowman and I’m a recent masters graduate
in neonatal health; I am currently seeking a position as a
neonatal nurse practitioner.

3. How did you get started in this field?
• I was a career changer that followed my sister into
nursing. I walked into the neonatal ICU, or NICU, as a
student nurse and knew I’d found my “spot.”

4. What training or education is required for
this type of work?
• I have my bachelor’s degree in nursing, as well as my
master’s degree in neonatal health. I also completed 675+
clinical hours (for my master’s degree) in addition to my
didactic work.

5. What areas of knowledge are most
important for advancement in this field?
• Neonatology!

6. Any specific degrees or certifications?
• Yes; a BSN, MSN, and a certification as an APRN, as well
as a license as an NNP.

7. What personal qualities or abilities are
important to being successful?
• You must be a dedicated life-long learner, as well as a
teacher for bedside RNs and parents, as well as residents
(in academic medical centers), and student nurse
practitioners. You must be curious, calm under pressure,
able to focus and think clearly in emergent situations.
Neonatal nurse practitioners must be incredibly detail
oriented, and have exceptional powers of observation and
intuition.

8. What do you do on a typical day in this
position?
• NNPs diagnose and treat any problem that neonates
experience i.e.: difficult birth, difficult transition to the
extra-uterine environment, congenital anomalies, as well
as a whole host of disease processes. You must be able
to develop a comprehensive, systems based plan of care
for your patients, enter the orders necessary to carry out
your plan, and monitor your patients changing health
status.

9. How many hours do you typically work
each week? Do you often work in the
evenings or weekends? Can you arrange
your own hours?
• At my current institution, NNPs generally work thirty-six-
hour work weeks. They rotate shifts and have flexibility in
self scheduling.

10. What part of this job do you find the most
challenging or satisfying?
• Responding to emergent delivery calls, code blues, and
the death of a baby are the most challenging aspect of the
job. The most satisfying is successfully helping a baby
transition after a difficult birth and when we finally get to
see a family off as they take a baby home after a
particularly difficult road.

11. What are the positive and negative
aspects of working in this field?
• The positives are the satisfying aspects noted above, as
well as being available to assist families through what are
the some of the biggest difficulties they will ever face. We
hold them up while they walk through unimaginable
difficulties.

12. What are the problems you see working in
this field?
• There is a national shortage, so it is not unusual for NNPs
to be in short supply … which translates to a shortage of
staff and large patient loads.

13. Would you rather work for a larger or
smaller company and why?
• I have trained in a level IV academic medical center which
is the area regional transport center and so hope to stay
in a large facility with higher acuity.

14. If you were starting out again, would you
do anything differently?
• I wish I had gone into nursing sooner, I graduated from
my undergraduate program at 42 and my masters
program at 52.

15. How would you evaluate the future of this
career field? How do you see this job
changing in the next 5 to 10 years?
• This field is wide open. Medical residents are newly
limited in the hours required in their neonatology rotations.
This means NNPs are in bigger demand, there is a
national shortage. This will likely increase over the next 5
to 10 years as NICUs become bigger and advancing
therapies (for both mothers and infants) mean more
preterm infants than ever are surviving leading to a larger
patient populations.

16. What special advice would you give a
person entering in this field?
• To make certain that you are committed to a career in
neonatology! It is incredibly specialized, ever-changing,
and demanding.

17. What, if anything, do you wish you had
known before you entered this
occupation?
• Nothing that stands out … I love what I do! It’s the best
job in the world!

18. What strategy would you suggest for a
Health Science student pursuing this
career?
• To try and find a shadow opportunity with someone in a
neonatal intensive care unit, and then to find a good
mentor.