Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing (OEHN) alumnus, Laura Johnson, was recently hired as an Occupational Health Nurse with Boston Scientific.

MCOHS web and communications coordinator, Joy Archibald, reached out to Laura to learn more about her new position, and how the OEHN program with MCOHS prepared her for her new career.

Congratulations, Laura!

Read the interview below…

A Conversation with OEHN Alum, Laura Johnson

What program of study/degree program were you in?
Master’s Degree in Public Health focusing on Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing

Briefly describe your experience as a student. What areas of study/research topics were you engaged in?
Occupational and environmental health nursing was my area of focus, but my coursework incorporated a variety of public health issues including occupational health and safety, global and local public health, youth violence, public health ethics, public health finance, disaster preparedness and response, environmental health issues, occupational medicine, epidemiology and injury and illness prevention.

My applied practice project was piloting an automated ergonomics program called Velocity EHS HumanTech for Boston Scientific. I filmed employees performing their job tasks, uploaded the videos to the HumanTech platform, performed manual hand/wrist assessments and added any required task forces. The automated features of the program along with my manually entered scoring provided an overall ergonomic score for the task. I analyzed and compared the results from this pilot program to REBAR, the ergonomics program previously used, and presented my findings to local, regional, and global leadership.

What was your overall experience in the OEHN program?
I really enjoyed my two years in the program and found it to be an eye-opening experience. My nursing background is in acute care, and I received very little public health education when I attended nursing school. There were many public health issues and concepts that were new to me, and I found myself listening intently to others, learning about their experiences in the public health arena.

What is your new position at Boston Scientific?
I am an Occupational Health Nurse.  My responsibilities include:

How did your training with MCOHS prepare you or help you in obtaining this position, and in your work going forward in this field?

I obtained my position with Boston Scientific through the success of the HumanTech pilot project and through my role as a contract nurse for Boston Scientific after this project. I began my training with MCOHS having no experience in occupational health and was able to take the knowledge I learned in school, along with my prior nursing knowledge and experiences, and apply it to my new career as an occupational health nurse. More specifically, Total Worker Health (TWH) was one of the concepts I learned while in school and has been very useful to me as I began this new career path. Keeping in mind TWH allows me to investigate and look at the bigger picture of why someone may be struggling at work. TWH is beneficial to both the employee and the employer and utilizing this concept in my practice is a way for me to be an advocate for both, which I have learned can be one of the challenges of an occupational health nurse.

During my time in the OEHN program, I was involved in a variety of activities, including:

I am very thankful for this opportunity to advance my education leading me to this new career direction in occupational health nursing. I not only gained new and valuable knowledge but also friendships along the way that positively impacted my overall experience.

I look forward to continuing to learn and grow as an occupational health nurse and my goal is to become certified in Occupational Health Nursing within 3 years.Laura Johnson