University Medical Center’s Nurses Educating on Illegal Drugs & Synthetics (NEIDS) is an outreach group of registered nurses that believe synthetic marijuana and other illegal drugs kill and harm too many of our fellow human beings. Jerrie Pharr, Charlie Williams, Theresa Cockhill, Erika Webb, and Vern Pharr are emergency nurses and nurse educators from Lubbock, Texas, whose mission is to provide education to the public on the health risks and hazards of the use of synthetic compounds and other harmful drugs. We accomplish this by utilizing public service announcements, focused educational offerings to school age children, point of care education, and working with local agencies against synthetic marijuana. We actively support new or revised legislation of local and state laws to halt the sale, distribution, and the manufacturing of these synthetic compounds and illegal drugs.
We provide education to schools, community organizations, health fairs, medical providers, law enforcement, and other focus groups. We continue to research and educate people to the hazards of synthetic compounds. Our group’s research has been presented at Lubbock Christian University-Scholars Colloquium, UMC Health System-University Medical Center- Nursing Research Poster Competition, TTUHSC/UMC Trauma & Critical Care Symposium, and many other state venues. NEIDS has maintained the Continuing Nursing Education (CNE) credit hours for presentations to nurses and EMS. 2.0 CNE will be offered to these groups.
UMC NEIDS Outreach team members:
Jerrie Pharr, MSN, RN, has been a Registered Nurse for 8 years and works in the Emergency Center at University Medical Center. Jerrie is a Trauma Nurse Leader and maintains data collection for our group. Jerrie’s focus is on community and nursing education related to the effects and treatment of patients who have used synthetic compounds and other drugs.
Charlie Williams, MSN, RN, has been a Registered Nurse for 10 years and works in the Emergency Center at University Medical Center. Charlie has done many outreach educational offerings to the community regarding injury prevention. Charlie’s mission is to educate the public on the severity of this horrible drug so we can continue to save as many lives as possible, since that is the reason we all became nurses.
Theresa Cockhill, BSN, RN, has been a Registered Nurse for 4 years and works in the Emergency Center at University Medical Center. Theresa has 12 years of military experience in the United States Air Force and understands the impact synthetics has had on our veterans. Her focus is on educating the public, as a preventative measure, on the effects of these poisons on the human body.
Erika Webb, A.D.N., RN, has been a Registered Nurse for 9 years and works in the Emergency Center at University Medical Center. Erika’s focus is to educate the public on the dangerous effects that synthetic drugs cause to the human body to prevent further injury from these drugs.
Vern Pharr, MSN, RN, CCRN, CPAN, CAPA, CEN, has been a Registered Nurse for 30 years. Vern is currently the Director of Surgical/Anesthesia Services at University Medical Center. Vern’s nursing background is in Emergency Nursing, Pre-Hospital Emergency Care, Surgical/Trauma Critical Care, and PeriAnesthesia Nursing. Vern’s nursing focus is on synthetic compound education outreach and research, legislation regarding synthetic compounds and illegal drugs, and professional nursing education.
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