Margaret (Peggy) Casey-Mederios
Margaret (Peggy) Casey-Mederios has been a Registered Nurse for over 30 years. Her experience has been largely in the development of training for nurses and nurse assistants in all health care settings. Since 1983 Peggy has been writing and implementing training materials for nurse assistants and home health aides. The primary focus of the material she has developed has always been the desire to teach caregivers how to balance the tasks of their jobs with the ability to care. Peggy believes this balance is necessary to ensure quality care while maintaining the resident’s, client’s, or patient’s quality of life.
As an employee of the National American Red Cross (ARC), Peggy was the primary nursing writer for ARC’s nurse assistant training materials published in 1989, a joint effort with Beverly Enterprises. These materials were implemented in various locations throughout Beverly’s nursing facilities along with a number of American Red Cross chapters. Peggy also participated in the American Red Cross’ first edition of Foundations for Caregiving, a book that focused on cross training caregivers for long term, home health, and acute care.
In 1992, the American Health Care Association selected Peggy to write their 2nd edition of How To Be a Nurse Assistant. This opportunity allowed Peggy to apply all her knowledge and experience in training nurse assistants into a package (textbook, workbook, and instructor’s manual) focused on long term care. The success of How To Be a Nurse Assistant led to an inservice series for long term care, also published by the American Heath Care Association.
In addition, she has worked with test development companies to design and implement OBRA-required competency evaluations. In 1993, she designed and implemented competency evaluation programs for three states. She also has wrote ARC’s Medication Administration Competency Evaluation, which is implemented throughout Massachusetts. Most recently she has published a training manual Administering Medication the Right Way.
Kathleen (Kathy) Masucci
Kathleen (Kathy) Masucci has been a Registered Nurse for 30 years. Her career has been in training RNs, direct caregiving staff, nurse assistants, and home health aides. For 15 years she was the lead trainer for American Red Cross of Massachusetts Bay and responsible for ensuring quality nurse assistant training throughout Massachusetts. Kathy also was the lead researcher for the 3rd Edition of How To Be a Nurse Assistant. For the 4th Edition, Kathy has been the primary author of the instructor’s materials.
She also co-founded CC & R Health Care Solutions, which wrote Administering Medications the Right Way, the current program used throughout Massachusetts.
Amy Bennett Coats (workbook and instructor’s manual)
Amy Bennett Coats has over 25 years experience as a manager, analyst, and educator within the health care industry. For the past 20 years she has been involved in the development of conferences, seminars, training programs, and compliance manuals for assisted living and nursing home providers and their employees.
Amy has worked for the American Health Care Association, the Assisted Living Federation of America, The American National Red Cross, and American Medical International.
Amy first collaborated with Margaret Casey-Mederios on the development of a nurse assistant training series for The American National Red Cross, which was published in 1989. They also developed training materials for direct care workers in assisted living for the American Health Care Association.
Amy has a master’s degree in education, with an emphasis in human resource development, from the George Washington University.