In 1971, Eileen Tangley’s father had a heart attack. He was taken to George Washington University Hospital, where he was treated with emergency bypass surgery. Eileen, in high school at the time, remembers a nurse—Leah was her name—who made all the difference in the world; she made both her and her father feel so much better as they went through the harrowing experience of emergency surgery. Eileen’s dad survived, and she came out of the experience thinking: “Man, I would love to do that.”

And that she did. Tangley started her career as a nurse forty years ago in 1983, when she graduated from nursing school at the Medical College of Virginia. “It was different back then,” she recalled. “Much smaller. When I came here, they had just built the Main Hospital.” After she graduated, she did an internship, working first in oral surgery, plastic surgery, and ophthalmology for six months, then for another six months in the cardiac surgery ICU.

She stayed with cardiac surgery first as a nurse, then later in a nurse management position until 1996, when Charlotte Roberts, ACNP, encouraged her to apply to the electrophysiology (EP) team. Tangley recalls being worried about the change, but she found that management work didn’t suit her, and she wanted to interact more with patients. Roberts gave her this advice: “Don’t worry about anybody but yourself in the long run when it comes to your career – do what feels right for you because you're the one that's really looking out for yourself.” Tangley has been with the EP department ever since.

...I realize that the patients need reassurance when they are struggling. By providing that, I feel like I can make a difference in a patient’s life every single day.

Eileen Tangley

Tangley has stuck with nursing for 40 years for one reason alone: patients. “I watch people in my department, like Ken [Ellenbogen], take on so much,” she said. “It’s hard! But then I realize that the patients need reassurance when they are struggling. By providing that, I feel like I can make a difference in a patient’s life every single day.”

Over her time here, Tangley has seen a lot of faces come and go. She’s seen a rise in new technologies, always adjusting to changes day-by-day. She recalls that when she first started in the EP lab, there was only one EP lab on the MCV campus—in West Hospital, with a cart that was rolled from one side of the bed to another depending on what kind of procedure was being performed. With hospitals rapidly adopting computerization over the past two decades, the volume of patients that could be taken in grew massively—now VCU hosts three EP labs and completes more than 2,500 EP procedures annually .

As she approaches retirement, Tangley says her ambitions have softened. She still comes in twice a week and has gone from a Nurse Clinician 4 to a Nurse Clinician 2. When she is not working, she spends her time at her home in the mountains, gardening, travelling with her best friends of fifty years, and volunteering. Tangley is a Virginia Master Naturalist who participates in local projects, gathering data about and protecting the natural resources of the Commonwealth. Here in Richmond, that means going to local restaurants to collect oyster shells for recycling to aid restoration projects.

A version of this story was originally published by VCU Health