COMMUNITY IMPACT AWARD
ERIN PÉREZ
Erin Perez, DNP, APRN, ANP-C, AGNP-C, ACHPN, has been selected for a 2022 Texas Nurse Practitioners (TNP) Community Impact Award, given annually to dedicated Texas nurse practitioners (NPs) who have made exceptional contributions to the health and well-being of their communities. Perez received the award September 24 during TNP’s 34th Annual Fall Conference.
“Nurse practitioners again faced numerous challenges in 2022, both as we adjusted to a return to normalcy and dealt with significant societal changes in the wake of COVID-19.
As always, our NPs rose to those challenges and played a crucial role in helping Texans everywhere get the care they needed, ranging from family practice and obstetrics to pediatrics and mental health care,” said TNP President Cindy Weston, DNP, APRN, CCRN, CNS-CC, FNP-BC, CHSE. “Erin Perez’s bold leadership and boundless energy have made her one of the state’s most prominent
leaders in many issues related to health care in Texas. Her dedication to her patients and her profession is evident in her efforts to spread awareness about respectful end-of-life care, to address health disparities in her community, and to advocate for policies to improve palliative care providers and patients.”
Perez is TNP’s President-Elect, a member of the Live Oak City Council, Chair of the Texas Palliative Care Interdisciplinary Advisory Council, and serves on the University Health System Supportive Care Team, the Texas Nurses Association COVID-19 Task Force, and the Nurses Care Hub Board of Directors, to name just a few. Her advocacy efforts were instrumental in the 2021 passage of legislation allowing NPs to sign death certificates in Texas, which eases the
burden on grieving families by relieving them of unnecessary wait times to find a physician to sign the paperwork.
She is currently in practice as a palliative care consultant for the University Health System in San Antonio. Perez earned her RN-BSN and AGNP from the University of Texas Medical Branch, where she delivered the 2022 commencement address.
Every year, TNP’s Fall Conference brings together hundreds of nurse practitioners, students, and stakeholders to discuss trends in health care, the state of the industry, and recent changes to Texas laws and regulations. This year’s event ran September 22-25.
