From her first job in Frankfort, Kentucky, as a medical-surgical nurse, to her role as senior vice president and chief nurse executive, Sammie Mosier, DHA, MA, BSN, NEBC (1974-2025), championed nurses and strengthened care teams across the country.

“But what made Sammie special was not just what she accomplished, but how she led,” says Sam Hazen, HCA Healthcare CEO. “She led with conviction and passion. She constantly pursued innovative solutions that helped HCA Healthcare’s 100,000 nurses deliver the best care possible. She was truly a nurse’s nurse.”

Following Mosier’s passing, the American Organization for Nursing Leadership noted her role in transforming the national health system “by spearheading advocacy initiatives to elevate nursing voices in policy, establishing a program to recognize unit-level excellence and pioneering a residency program to advance early career nurse development.”

To honor Mosier’s legacy and her decades of service to HCA Healthcare, the organization launched the $1 million Sammie Mosier Legacy Fund, which will support future Galen College of Nursing students. “We are committed to keeping Sammie’s legacy alive,” continues Hazen.

Crystal Dugger, HCA Healthcare’s chief learning officer, believes the scholarship criteria’s six tenets reflect Mosier’s core values. Dugger joins colleagues across the organization in reflecting on the legacy Mosier leaves, not only for her patients, but also for her colleagues and for future nurses around the world.

When HCA Healthcare, like every other hospital network in the country, experienced a nursing shortage, Mosier refused to accept limitations.

“She didn’t say, ‘Well we can’t do that because we have a staffing crisis,” Dugger says. “Instead, she said, ‘OK, then, let’s purchase a nursing school and develop relationships with schools to support our hospital programs.”

Mosier ultimately spearheaded HCA Healthcare’s acquisition of Galen College of Nursing while also building a robust residency program designed to support nurses early in their careers. The collaboration has resulted in more than 20 Galen campuses and more than 47,000 nursing graduates — helping address the national nursing shortage.

“She forged strong relationships with HR, clinical education, our analytics teams, our labor teams,” says Dugger, who worked closely with Mosier. “If she believed a team might be a barrier to an important initiative, she encouraged us to build partnerships with them so that we could move forward effectively. Everyone wanted to help accomplish her vision.”

Mosier also developed a clear infrastructure to support her vision — and made sure every stakeholder understood it.

“You could ask any CNO across the organization what the four pillars of nursing are, and they can tell you exactly what they are,” Dugger says. “They know what components fall under them, where their data sits and how they plan to mitigate challenges.”

Her clarity created accountability and established communications structures that supported nursing leadership at every level.

Those who worked with Mosier knew what they could expect: authenticity, consistency and respect. “She was very compassionate,” Dugger says. “If you were struggling, she really cared about you and wanted to make sure you had all the support you needed.”

Mosier knew from an early age that she would become a nurse. Her mother, one of her greatest mentors, was also a nurse, and her father coached her childhood basketball team. Dugger believes their influence shaped Mosier’s belief that nursing is a team effort.

“When you’re on a team, you’re making each other better and growing together,” Dugger says.

A temporary exhibit in the HCA Healthcare Impact Center honors Mosier’s life and legacy. A pair of “Walk in Your World” shoes represents the program she launched in 2021 to broaden leaders’ understanding of nurses’ daily realities.

Dugger says it can be difficult to fully appreciate the emotional highs and lows nurses face every day without seeing it firsthand.

Through the program, leaders across the organization spend one day each year wearing scrubs and shadowing nurses on the floor.

“If you are working on a cancer floor, you might go from caring for a patient who has just moved into hospice for end-of-life care straight into another room, where a patient undergoing chemotherapy has just received great news about their treatment,” Dugger says. “Then you leave there and walk right back into the hospice room.”

Kelli Nations, VP and chief nurse executive for the American Group, says Mosier’s enthusiasm for life and dedication to her patients shaped everything she did.

“She believed if the people piece is not what it needs to be, you can’t move forward with anything else,” Nations says. “Her focus on making sure our front-line nurses had what they needed to succeed will continue to guide the work we do for years to come.”

At Galen’s Aurora campus, Mosier played a key role in implementing interactive learning environments through the HCA Healthcare Center for Clinical Advancement. These spaces feature technology-enabled classrooms and advanced simulation labs equipped with high-fidelity simulators that mirror real patient-care scenarios.

This work fostered a culture of inquiry, innovation and evidence-based practice.

Last year, Mosier helped launch HCA Healthcare’s inaugural Nursing Research Day, highlighting research that is shaping the future of patient care.

“When Sammie evaluated new technology and new processes, she always looked at them through the nurses’ lens,” Dugger says. “If it would make their work easier or better support them in implementing their care, she was excited about it.”

Mosier was also known for her ability to execute complex initiatives with precision and purpose.

“She believed the strongest decisions begin with listening — hearing directly from nurses, understanding their challenges and ensuring their voices shaped solutions that strengthened patient care and supported caregivers,” Dugger says.

During an HCA Healthcare Unit of Distinction awards ceremony on April 15, 2025, Mosier honored 197 nursing units recognized as top-performing teams across the organization.

The awards, launched by Mosier in 2015, recognize the top 5% of nursing units for measurable excellence in advocacy and leadership, consistency in nursing practices and operations, and leveraging scale to advance patient care.

Through it all, the hard work, the advocacy and the unwavering commitment to growth, Mosier brought joy to those around her. “It was fun to laugh with her,” says Erica Rossitto, senior vice president and chief nurse executive. “She was intentional about bringing that sense of joy into work so that we all, too, could find joy in our work. Because of Sammie, we all rallied around being a part of something bigger.”