By Darby Kendall
As a child, Olivia Ades-Lawlor never would have guessed that she would one day become a nurse. Today, Ades-Lawlor, RN, B.S. ’23, set to graduate with her D.N.P. this June, looks back at her younger perspective with a laugh.
“Growing up, I hated hospitals and I hated even seeing ambulances. It made me super anxious, and I couldn’t even watch medical shows,” Ades-Lawlor explained. “Then at some point during college, some of that fear morphed into fascination, and I found myself really interested in medicine.”
During her time as an undergraduate at the University of Vermont, Ades-Lawlor’s classes on environmental studies led her to the field she works in today, with a trip abroad cementing her interest.
“I ended up focusing on human health and the environment, and how the chemicals in our environment can impact long-term health and short-term health. I studied abroad in Thailand, and while there, I got to visit a lot of different communities, and we did projects based on what the community needed,” Ades-Lawlor said. “I spent a lot of time doing reproductive health and contraceptive education for high schoolers and adults, and I loved that work. I loved doing the research and then translating that into patient-friendly language.”
Her experience in Thailand inspired Ades-Lawlor to focus on reproductive health in her continued schooling, and in 2022, she started attending OHSU for the School of Nursing’s Accelerated Bachelor’s to D.N.P. program. One of Ades-Lawlor’s favorite memories from her time earning her B.S. with a major in nursing at OHSU was the assigned population health rotation.
“For the rotation, I was placed at a high school, where I found that I loved working with adolescents. I learned a ton about what Multnomah has to offer the county in terms of school-based health clinics,” Ades-Lawlor reflected. “It’s free for most folks, and they’ll see students and their families, regardless of insurance status. That was a really cool moment to see what medicine should be; it should be open to everyone. It should have low barriers to access, and it’s based in your community. Getting to work there with the nurse practitioner and seeing how she built relationships with her patients and was a very trusted resource in the community, that was impactful for me, because I realized I want to be like that. I want to do that.”
Another experience that made an impression on Ades-Lawlor’s professional path was her fellowship at Planned Parenthood. She worked there for nearly two years, and it prepared her for the primary care job she’ll begin at OHSU after graduating.
“During my D.N.P. program, I worked for Planned Parenthood as a fellow on the medical services team. I helped create all the standards and guidelines all the clinics have to follow across the country, and I loved it. I have always loved reproductive health and abortion access work, but this was a really great way to translate some of my science-based information into patient education. It was just an amazing experience,” Ades-Lawlor said. “I worked as a nurse there, and then worked doing vaccines, and now I have a job with OHSU in primary care that I’ll start in the fall. I’ll get to see folks across their lifespans and do the all the primary care offerings, including reproductive health care.”
During her time at OHSU, Ades-Lawlor has benefited from the Health Equity Grant ANEW Scholarship awarded through the School of Nursing, which she said made her education more accessible. “That scholarship has been life changing. I had to take out so many fewer loans because of it… I really appreciate that it focused on us shedding light on needs in our community,” Ades-Lawlor said. “I know a lot of my other classmates have also benefited from it.”
Looking back on how far she’s come, both mentally in her approach to medicine and physically in her move to Portland from the East Coast, Ades-Lawlor has no regrets in choosing OHSU for her education.
“I want to emphasize that OHSU is such an amazing place to learn,” Ades-Lawlor said. “I hope that future students will continue to take advantage of the full spectrum of things that OHSU has to offer and the connections it provides. It’s a far-reaching institution, and a lot of opportunities are afforded to us students because we got to go to school here, and it’s great.”
Community | Health Equity | Students & Alumni
Patient Care | Students & Alumni
Students & Alumni
