100 Women We Love: Class Of 2019

Rachel Walker

Photo by Heather Duggan

Rachel Walker, who last year became the first-ever nurse to be named an “Invention Ambassador” by the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Lemelson Foundation, is a self-described “queer nurse inventor who practices public health nursing at the intersection of community and biotech.” Surprisingly, she never imagined she’d become a nurse, let alone ascend to the vanguard of her profession. Serving in the Peace Corps in Mali changed that. She “developed such an awe for the knowledge, skills, and general badassery of the Malian nurses and midwives I worked alongside,” that she enrolled in nursing school upon her return to the U.S. It was there that she met “amazing women inventing new ways to support healing and well-being with and for communities impacted by forces like violence, poverty, and structural racism,” Walker says. Nurse inventors believe technology is just a tool, and that it should always be co-designed with the community in ways that “support human dignity, capability, and justice,” Walker explains. “Nurses are masters at Making. It. Work. No. Matter. What.” She describes what she works for and what she hopes for. “Just imagine what might be possible, if we properly supported and made space for nurse innovators working at every level of practice and education? I want to live in that world.”—JDG


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