Diane Wynne’s priority as Administrative Staff Associate is to keep things moving – in particular to make sure administrators, faculty, and staff in her Department are where they are supposed to be. Managing office schedules is a vital responsibility that has become more cumbersome over time with the growth of the campus in her 40 years of UT Southwestern employment.

Ms. Wynne works in the Department of Surgery’s General and Acute Care Surgery Division. She says when she started, the Department had about 15 faculty members. Today, that number has grown to approximately 70.

Diane Wynne

She works for the Department’s Executive Vice Chair of Clinical Operations and the Interim Co-Trauma Medical Directors for Parkland Trauma Services. She also helps coordinate Advanced Trauma Life Support courses, which provide community physicians, nurse practitioners, and residents the opportunity to increase their trauma knowledge and skills.

The institution’s evolution has been special for Ms. Wynne to witness.

The expansion of the medical campus has been amazing to watch over the years. It has been interesting to watch the new William P. Clements Jr. University Hospital and Parkland Hospital open and continue to grow and excel in patient care, research, and resident and medical student education, she says.

Originally hired as a Secretary in 1978, Ms. Wynne has no regrets about working for the same institution the past 40 years.

I enjoy what I am doing. The people I work with are fun to be around. People seem surprised that I have stayed in the same Department for so long. But the Department and Division have been good to me, so I have remained, she says.

Because of the longevity in her role, Ms. Wynne says colleagues know they can depend on her and they see her as the “encyclopedia of Surgery Department history.”

Kendra Armijo, a colleague in Ms. Wynne’s Department, agrees with that assessment.

Diane knows a lot, not only about the people who have trained or been faculty members, but also usually where they are currently. She’s much faster than Google to get that information. She knows so much Department history and has worked with some of the giants of Surgery, Ms. Armijo says.

Ms. Wynne also currently serves as the Secretary for the Parkland Surgical Society, an alumni association for the residents who have trained at UT Southwestern and Parkland Hospital.

I really enjoy being able to keep up with the residents who have completed their training here and working with them to plan their yearly reunion, Ms. Wynne says.

Outside of work, Ms. Wynne enjoys reading, sports, shopping, and attending Dallas Symphony Orchestra concerts and Dallas Summer Musicals shows. In just a few more years she might have more time to enjoy these hobbies. After a long career, she’ll likely start to consider retirement in the not-too-distant future, but she hasn’t quite gotten far enough to make plans beyond working at UT Southwestern.