Girls of the Yr 2023 Honorees Half 1

Picture By: Roberto Gonzalez

Jennifer Tickal Keehbauch, MD 

Chief Medical Officer | AdventHealth Winter Park 

Jennifer Tickal Keehbauch remembers when her medical college mentor on the College of Florida would take her to a rural clinic the place grateful folks obtained desperately wanted healthcare. At present, as she lives out AdventHealth’s mission to “prolong the therapeutic ministry of Christ,” she recollects that have in offering whole-person care.

“Dr. Keehbauch’s affect on Central Florida is troublesome to explain in phrases,” in response to her nomination, which commends her availability, attentiveness, and her management by the pandemic.

Beneath her management, the Leapfrog Group has named AdventHealth Winter Park as an A-rated security hospital 5 years in a row. The hospital has additionally earned nationwide certification for its stroke and orthopedic joint packages. 

Keehbauch’s concern for the uninsured led her to open AdventHealth Neighborhood Drugs Clinic. “To see it thriving and persevering with to serve Central Florida as we strategy the 20-year anniversary this 12 months has been very fulfilling,” says Keehbauch.

“I hope that I’ve handed on a love of serving these most in must the residents I’ve mentored all through the years,” she provides.

Kelly Nierstedt 

Senior Vice President, Orlando Well being | President, Orlando Well being Orlando Regional Medical Heart

Serving others is second nature to Kelly Nierstedt, who started her profession as a nurse. She is particularly captivated with addressing the well being and wellness of girls as they juggle a number of calls for.

“Kelly Nierstedt’s transformative management is guiding one of many largest hospitals within the nation,” her nomination boasts.

“I hope that I’m often called a champion for increasing care and entry to providers for individuals who want it probably the most,” Nierstedt says.

She helped launch Orlando Well being Girls’s Pavilion — Winter Park, an all-in-one medical middle for girls. Nierstedt additionally helped safe a $2.54 million grant to scale back well being disparities amongst pregnant or postpartum minority girls whereas working to supply nutritious meals for at-risk pregnant girls. As well as, she oversaw the distribution of almost 3,000 backpacks to native college students.

Nierstedt takes affected person care personally. Throughout her tenure at Orlando Well being Winnie Palmer Hospital for Girls and Infants, she posted her cell quantity within the room of each affected person. “I problem the groups I assist to supply the best degree of medical care, and the result’s that we ship nation-leading outcomes that change folks’s lives.”

Paula Waters Rutledge

Founder and President, Legacy MedSearch | Board Member, Alzheimer’s Affiliation Central and North Chapter

Described in her nomination as a “passionate philanthropist for Alzheimer’s analysis” because of dropping her mom to the illness, Paula Waters Rutledge makes it her life’s mission to discover a treatment whereas offering a office the place her colleagues can thrive.

Rutledge misplaced her mother—a former South Florida detective she describes as “‘Miami Vice’ earlier than Don Johnson ever placed on a leisure swimsuit”—to Alzheimer’s in 2019. Her life’s mission in all her endeavors is to make her mother and father proud.

“Each small measure of success I could accomplish has roots in my idyllic childhood and my mother and father shepherding their kids in a life centered round household, pals, and serving God and neighborhood,” she says.

Rutledge channels her father’s enterprise acumen at Legacy MedSearch, which she based in 2005 to “present my teammates a joyful place to make an excellent residing to supply for his or her households.”

Personally, she says she desires to be “half the girl my mother was” and “half the businessperson my dad was” whereas residing to see an finish to Alzheimer’s.

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