Jeannette Burchfield has tried to make life better for mothers and their babies since 1977. That’s when she began working as at Staff Nurse at Parkland Memorial Hospital in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU).

“I developed a love for neonatal medicine that continues to this day,” Ms. Burchfield says.

In 1984, she took the next step and joined UT Southwestern when she conducted research for a breastfeeding study with Dr. Jon Tyson, a former faculty member.

“Dr. Tyson was my mentor,” Ms. Burchfield says. “He taught me the importance of conducting high quality research in an ethical manner, with great attention to detail.”

Now a Senior Research Nurse in the Division of Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine, she manages the divisional database for Parkland’s NICU.

“The data I collect is used to make a difference in neonatal care,” Ms. Burchfield says. “That gives me a great deal of job satisfaction.”

After 35 years, Ms. Burchfield still has the same response as to why she has had such a long career at one institution – “I enjoy my job. I like the autonomy, and I enjoy the people I work with.”

She serves as an unofficial instructor to other nurses, teaching them to decipher and monitor the database. Her supervisor, Dr. Luc Brion, Professor of Pediatrics, regards her as a pleasure to work with and praises her attention to detail.

“Jeannette has been running the database meticulously for decades with a minimal error rate, which gives the database its validity,” Dr. Brion says. “She does an excellent job at pointing out difficult decisions, such as an unclear statement in a radiologist’s reading, leading to discussions with me and potential requests to radiologists for final adjudication.”

Outside of work, Ms. Burchfield loves to read and enjoys spending time with her three children and three grandchildren.