Veneta Masson has practiced as a registered nurse for 35 years in community and hospital settings both in the United States and abroad. In 1978, she helped to found a small, inner-city clinic in Washington, DC. For the next 17 years, she was a family nurse practitioner and, eventually, director of Community Medical Care. She also began to write essays and poems from her clinic experiences. Since leaving Community Medical Care in 1995, she has published two books. Rehab at the Florida Avenue Grill is a collection of poems about some of those patients whose lives changed hers. Ninth Street Notebook — Voice of a Nurse in the City, winner of an American Journal of Nursing Book of the Year award for 2001, contains lessons, stories and reflections from her years at CMC, including what she learned about caring for the poor and uninsured. She hopes the stories these books tell will serve as soul food for caregivers and all who care about healing art.
Veneta lives in Washington, D.C. and continues her exploration of healing art in all its forms.
