CRNA Day

WHEREAS, Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists (CRNA’s) are essential to America’s healthcare system, providing high-quality, cost-effective anesthesia care for 150 years who safely administer more than 34 million anesthetics to patients each year; and

WHEREAS, CRNA’s are the primary providers of anesthesia care in rural America, enabling healthcare facilities in these medically underserved areas to offer obstetrical, surgical, and trauma stabilization services.  In some states, CRNAs are the sole providers in nearly 100 percent of the rural hospitals; and

WHEREAS, CRNA’s practice in every setting in which anesthesia is delivered: traditional hospital surgical suites and obstetrical delivery rooms, the offices of dentists, podiatrists, ophthalmologists, and plastic surgeons, ambulatory surgical centers, United States Military and Public Health Services and Veterans Administration medical facilities; and

WHEREAS, nurse anesthetists have been the main provider of anesthesia care to U.S. military personnel on the front lines since WWI, including current conflicts in the Middle East.  Nurses first provided anesthesia to wounded soldiers during the Civil War:

NOW, THEREFORE, I, Robert Bentley, Governor of Alabama, do hereby proclaim April 8, 2015, as

CRNA Day

in the state of Alabama.