Susan Langlois brings over fourteen years of hands-on experience as an operating room nurse with a special interest in orthopedics. As a veteran of the US Army Nurse Corps, she gained valuable orthopedic trauma experience at Martin Army Hospital at Fort Benning, Georgia. She subsequently worked in operating rooms at hospitals in Raleigh, NC and Wilmington, NC, again specializing in orthopaedics.

     She developed a keen interest in the budding field of nursing informatics after participating in the Horizon Project, a successful computerization effort by New Hanover Health Network to solve the difficult task of interfacing surgeon's preference cards with the startup of perpetual inventory of supplies and operating room charge items.   

    This special blend of operating room experience, knowledge of orthopaedic procedures and products, and acknowledged leadership in the field of nursing informatics makes Ms. Langlois an invaluable asset to Orthopaediclist.com in molding our site to the ever changing needs of operating room professionals.

     Ms. Langlois is a member of the Association of Operating Room Nurses, the National Association of Orthopaedic Nurses, and the American Nurses Informatics Association. She holds a Batchelor of Science in Nursing from the School of Nursing at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, and is currently pursuing a Master of Nursing Informatics from the University of Nebraska.

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    Susan Langlois was raised in the country in Parke County, Indiana where she graduated from Turkey Run High School in 1968. During her high school years she served as an officer of many school organizations, but her greatest thrill was serving on the Governor'sYouth Council to the United Nations. After graduating from high school and obtaining several lucrative scholarships, she enrolled in and graduated from DePauw University School of Nursing, Greencastle, Indiana. DePauw University was one of the few programs to offer a Bachelor of Science in Nursing, at that time.

    During her junior year she joined the Army Nurse Corps and upon graduation in 1968 and successfully passing her licensing exams, she reported to active duty to Martin Army Hospital, Fort Benning, Georgia. She was a student, staff member and ultimately a teacher in the operating room at Martin Army Hospital. At that time, Martin Army Hospital served as an orthopaedic center for injured military personnel returning from Viet Nam. It was a wonderful orthopaedic experience for a young operating room nurse in that it provided experience in the type of orthopaedic trauma that was seldom seen in civilian life. In 1970 when her tour of duty was finished, she returned to Indiana as a staff nurse in the operating room at Union Hospital in Terre Haute, Indiana. Several months after joining the staff she was promoted to charge nurse.

    In 1971 she married a dashing young Army engineer and became a wife and eventually the mother of four wonderful children. She left nursing at that time and did not return until 1988. In 1988 she returned to the operating room at Rex Hospital and Raleigh Community Hospitals in Raleigh, NC. She became a member of the orthopaedic team in the operating room at both hospitals and by 1989 worked solely at Raleigh Community Hospital. In 1992 she became the nurse educator for the operating room staff at Raleigh Community Hospital. However, in 1994 her husband was transferred to Wilmington, NC and she joined the ortho/neuro team in the operating room at New Hanover Regional Medical Center.

    In 1997 the hospital acquired the software for centralized scheduling and decided to start with the operating room. It became rapidly apparent that clinical input was going to be helpful, so when she was offered the position of liaison from the operating room to the scheduling office she welcomed the new opportunity. In 2000 she became the Schedule Facilitator / Resource Nurse for the operating room at Cape Fear Hospital after it was acquired by New Hanover Health Network. In 2002 she became a part-time consultant in support of the Horizon Project which was the upgrade application of software for the computerization of the surgeon's preference cards in conjunction with the startup of perpetual inventory interface of supplies and charges for the operating room. In 2002 she also became a graduate student at the University of Nebraska College of Nursing in pursuit of a Master's in Nursing Informatics. She is a member of the Association of Operating Room Nurses, American Nurses Informatics Association, National Association of Orthopaedic Nurses and Sigma Theta Tau International Honorary Society (the Phi Beta Kappa of Nursing).

    Nursing informatics is a fairly new field for nurses. Working with the building, startup and maintenance of orthopaediclist.com is truly an opportunity for her to make nursing informatics useful to orthopaedic professionals. She feels that orthopaedic professionals who work in the operating room need a resource like this that is user friendly and easily attainable with information that is efficiently accessible. She sees orthopaediclist.com as the perfect tool to meet these needs.