Chelsea Schafer

Chelsea Schafer, BSN, RN, TCRN is the recipient of the 2019 AJN/Thelma Schorr Scholarship. In 2014, Chelsea graduated magna cum laude with her Bachelor of Science in Nursing from the University of South Carolina's Honors College. She also graduated with Leadership Distinction in Professional and Civic Engagement. Following graduation, Chelsea returned to her hometown of Baltimore, Maryland where she began working at the R. Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center on the multi-trauma intermediate care unit. In 2016 Chelsea enrolled in the Doctor of Nursing Practice program at the University of Maryland, Baltimore with a Family Nurse Practitioner specialty.

When Chelsea was eleven years old, her eldest brother died from sudden cardiac arrest during his college lacrosse game. This event is what inspired her to pursue a career in nursing. She wanted to take on an active role in preventing this tragedy from happening to others. After a year and a half of working in Shock Trauma, Chelsea again recognized her passion for prevention of injury and illness. Therefore, she chose to begin her journey to her doctorate to become a Family Nurse Practitioner.

Chelsea continues to work part-time in Shock Trauma’s Outpatient Clinic, and also works as a graduate teaching assistant for University of Maryland’s Clinical Nurse Leaders program. Chelsea is a current member of Sigma Theta Tau Honor Society and the Nurse Practitioner Association of Maryland. Chelsea is also a member of Shock Trauma’s Trauma Prevention Council and with them she attends a consortium of community outreach events.

Chelsea has spent much of her educational career researching ways to prevent sudden cardiac death in student athletes. Currently, Chelsea volunteers with the University of Maryland’s Children's Heart Program by performing electrocardiograms at local universities during yearly sports physicals. For Chelsea’s doctoral project, she will be working with a local chain of urgent cares to implement the American Heart Association’s recommended cardiac screening tool to be used during student athlete pre-participation sport physicals.

After graduation, Chelsea hopes to continue to spread awareness about sudden cardiac death in student athletes and to continue to volunteer with programs aimed at providing thorough cardiac screenings for student athletes during pre-participation sports physicals. Chelsea’s overall goal is to prevent sudden cardiac death in all student athletes and to keep other families from experiencing the pain that she and her family experienced due to the death of her brother.