Sadie Heath Cabaniss

Sadie Heath Cabaniss (1865 to 1921) was a pioneer of professional nursing in Virginia. Born in Petersburg, she trained at the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing and worked as a night supervisor at Johns Hopkins Hospital before becoming operating room supervisor at the Old Dominion Hospital in Richmond. There the faculty of the Medical College of Virginia asked her to build a nurse training school on the Nightingale plan, which she ran from 1895 to 1901 and which survives as the School of Nursing at Virginia Commonwealth University. She organised the Nurses Settlement of Richmond, was founder and first president of the Virginia State Association of Nurses and president of the state board that examined nurses. Her career was devoted to public health, and she was inducted into the American Nurses Association Hall of Fame in 2002.