Gabby Kearney ’24 was hoping to see a craniotomy during her clinical rotation in the operating room at Dell Seton Medical Center. She knew it was a possibility because her classmates at Fairfield University’s Marion Peckham Egan School of Nursing and Health Studies had previously observed the procedure while on rotation there. She never imaged, though, that the experience would also include an invitation to view a patient’s brain up close during surgery.

Kearney and her classmates are in their third semester of the Accelerated Second Degree Nursing (ASDNU) program at the Austin campus and are enrolled in Medical Surgical Nursing II. The clinical component of that course has landed them in the operating rooms of local hospitals with whom the school has clinical partnerships. 

When Kearney arrived at Dell Seton for her clinical rotation, she was scheduled to observe the removal of a brain tumor. She watched from afar as the neurosurgeon performed a craniotomy to gain access to the golf-ball-sized mass on the frontal lobe of the patient’s brain. That experience alone was amazing and rare. But then Kearney was invited to take a closer look. “I was ecstatic,” she recalled. “The neurosurgeon turned around to me after exposing the tumor from under the dura and asked if I wanted to come closer to see the tumor on the brain before he removed it!”

Classmate Lindsey Hitt ’24 observed a similar procedure but under very different circumstances: an emergency craniotomy on a patient involved in a motor vehicle accident. Hitt watched as the attending neurosurgeon and resident neurosurgeon used ICG angiography to assess blood flow through the cerebral vessels. When leakage was identified, they removed a section of the skull to expose the brain and cauterize the bleeding. Hitt was present during the entire perioperative period. “I was with the patient from pre-op to post-op,” she said. “It was cool to observe the entire process.”

Clinicals are a core element of nursing education because they provide supervised practical experience in a variety of healthcare settings, and Kearney and Hitt gained valuable knowledge and insights from the team of experienced nurses and physicians in the operating room. Working with a nurse of 35 years, Kearney watched classroom concepts and skills come to life and even learned the purpose and use of every tool employed during the surgery.

“That students have the opportunity to observe major surgical procedures like craniotomies speaks to the strength and quality of our clinical partnerships in and around Austin,” said Clinical Coordinator Megan Nava, MSN, RN, CMSRN.

The Egan School also partners with Ascension Seton, Baylor Scott & White Health, St. David’s HealthCare, and the Central Texas Veterans Health Care System to ensure its students receive the highest quality clinical experiences available in the Greater Austin area.

Fairfield Egan’s ASDNU program is accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education. Upon completion of the program, students are eligible to sit for the National Council Licensure Exam to become registered nurses.