Price named medical school nurse of the year

The Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University named Bobbie Lou Price as its nurse of the year during a ceremony May 4 at the Rock Springs Center.

Price is the bariatric program nurse manager for the Department of Surgery and has worked at ECU for nine years.

A 1990 graduate of Farmville Central High School, Price earned her bachelor of science in nursing degree from Barton College in 1994. After graduation, she worked for two years on the surgical immediate unit at Pitt County Memorial Hospital before joining ECUs Department of Surgery.

Price

Price said she was surprised and thrilled to learn she was the nurse of the year. “I always wanted to be a nurse,” she said. “When I was in elementary school, I wanted to be a brain surgeon, and then I figured out what it takes to be a brain surgeon, so then I decided to be a nurse. I’ve always liked helping people, so nursing is a great fit for me.”

As nurse manager for the bariatric surgery program, Price works with morbidly obese patients who come to ECU’s internationally recognized gastric bypass surgery program. Last year, the program’s four surgeons saw more than 500 new patients and performed about 200 surgeries.

“I like giving people a second chance on life, helping them to be able to participate in daily activities that they would not be able to do without weight loss,” Price said.

Because of her work with the bariatric surgery program, Price has been invited to present ECU’s research findings and clinical experiences at national and international surgery conferences. She is a member of Sigma Theta Tau, the nursing honor society, and the American Society of Bariatric Surgery and serves on the Allied Health Sessions Committee for the International Federation for Surgery of Obesity.

A native of Farmville, Price is the daughter of Bobby and Gail Joyner and granddaughter of Minnie Bailey, all of Farmville. She and her husband, Doug Price, also live in Farmville.