TENNESSEE HEALTH CARE HALL OF FAME NOMINEE NANCY KERR

Nancy Kerr was born in Malaysia to British parents. As a nurse in England during WWII, she met her future husband, Jim Kerr of Knoxville, Tennessee. The couple returned to Tennessee together, and Nancy Kerr lived and worked in Tennessee for 60 of her 80 years.

Kerr earned her second nursing degree in Tennessee (her first while in England) and became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1956. The organization Freedom Foundation Valley Forge awarded her the George Washington Honor Medal for public address to newly naturalized citizens.

A tireless worker, Kerr served as a hospice nurse and as a bereavement counselor who assisted with workshops on “life transitions.” In 1979, Kerr helped establish the first hospice program at Fort Sanders Hospital. It was also one of the first programs of its kind in Tennessee. She worked tirelessly to pioneer the hospice movement in Tennessee and the surrounding states. Her innovative work was said to change the culture of health care in Tennessee. Kerr traveled across the country to learn from other experts and she gave more than 200 lectures to promote this bold new concept: that terminal patients deserved to die at home, in comfort.

All the while, she was working hard as an on-call nurse at home at Fort Sanders Hospice Program, caring for terminally ill patients and comforting their families. These grieving families often felt so touched by her care they would insist she receive friends alongside them at their loved one’s funeral service. Kerr was known as a patient advocate long before the phrase became trendy.

Her well-earned honors and accolades include the DAR Citizenship award, given to naturalized citizens, Woodmen of the World for outstanding service (1979) and the Tennessee Medical Association Community Service Award (voted unanimously, 1982).