Danna Bossert, FNP, Sanford Health

One step led to another for Minot’s Danna Bossert, whose educational path to become a nurse practitioner was paved with the help of nontraditional options and a supportive employer.

Bossert has practiced family medicine as a nurse practitioner at Sanford Health’s Northwest Clinic in Minot since October 2019. She has been with Sanford, advancing her education, for almost nine years.

“I cannot say enough good things about Sanford,” she said. “When I told them that I wanted to go back to school, they not only were accommodating, they essentially pushed me to it and said, ‘This is what we look for in our nurses. We want our nurses to be able to grow within our system.'”

A graduate of Bishop Ryan High School in Minot, she worked at Roosevelt Park Zoo from her teen years until the flood of 2011, which prompted her move to Bismarck after the family home was damaged.

Before leaving Minot, she completed most of her training as a certified nursing assistant at Trinity Health through the Dakota Nursing Program and Williston State College. She had worked as a CNA at The Wellington, a Minot assisted-living center.

Her interest in health care had been sparked when her father almost died from a stroke when she was a senior in high school. She and a brother were the only ones to aid their father until medical help was available, and it impressed on both of them the importance of knowing how to respond.

Once she became a CNA, she began considering advancing her education to become a licensed practical nurse. The Dakota Nursing Program provided the ideal option for training.

She worked as an LPN from 2011 to 2013 before enrolling at the University of Mary to become a registered nurse. As an LPN she worked in a long-term acute care program and later in a walk-in, acute care setting at Sanford Health in Bismarck, where she was living at the time. It was the motivation provided by her Sanford boss, Jeff Klop, that prompted her decision to advance her skills as an RN. Sanford provided her the clinical setting needed in her training.

Bossert said the opportunities presented her at Sanford put her in the best possible positions as a nurse. Picking up overtime hours by filling shifts at various clinics on her days off as an LPN, she ended up in Sanford’s internal medicine department, working with internal medicine nephrologist Dr. Michael LeBeau, now Sanford’s CEO in Bismarck. After graduating from the University of Mary, she joined the department as a special procedures RN. She worked there for about three years.

Becoming a nurse practitioner was always in the back of her mind, she said. However, she credits her exposure to team-based care under LeBeau and nurse practitioner Sally Frank to providing the impetus. Bossert explained she was able to see the autonomy a nurse practitioner can have and gain the encouragement to take that latest step in her education.

She did so by enrolling in Maryville State University in St. Louis, Mo. Training was online, and Bossert completed clinicals with Sanford.

“They were super accommodating. I had clinicals at my fingertips at all times,” she said of Sanford. “Even state programs struggle to find clinical settings for people, and not one second did I doubt that I would find clinical spots.”

Becoming a clinical nurse practitioner is really all about the clinical training, Bossert said. Sanford pushed her during her clinical training and never backed off.

“I was thrown into the fire essentially. They knew me as a nurse. They knew what my scope of practice was and they also knew my potential,” she said. “They kept essentially the foot on the gas the whole time and pushed me to learn. It’s definitely one of those degrees where, if you’re not willing to put in an effort, you’re not going to get as good of an education. But if you have clinical settings where they know that you can push yourself harder, they’re going to make sure that your training is the best training out there.”

Sanford also offers a nursing loan program to assist with the financial side of education. Bossert said she was able to continue working while training, although her work became part-time toward the end due to the rigor of the clinicals.

Bossert had returned to Minot and was able to do a majority of her clinical training at Sanford’s family practice clinic in Minot. Now practicing in Minot, Bossert provides a variety of care in the family practice setting.

“It’s been nice to come home and be able to now give back to this community,” she said. She also finds she enjoys family practice more than she ever thought she would.

“I love the patients, I love the connections that you get to make with patients. You get to do that as a nurse, but it’s just not on the same level. There’s something about people trusting you with their health care and coming to you and wanting to form that connection that I thrive off,” Bossert said. “Being able to really fully understand their health care and wanting to be able to work with them to make sure we’re getting their quality of life where it should be while still maintaining their health is like a rush for me.”

Bossert hasn’t set any new goals yet but ideas are starting to formulate.

“I do think down the road that educating nurses is something that I would be very interested in,” she said. “What a cool job to get to teach other nurses what you already know in this skill set. That definitely is calling my name at some point.”