Providing patient care — and hope — for 35 years

Phuong Tran, RN, OCN, is a nurse manager at Fred Hutch at EvergreenHealth in Kirkland, Washington who has spent her entire 35-year career at Fred Hutch Cancer Center. There is one thing that fuels her passion for nursing, and gives her purpose.

It’s hope. 

“I love that I can be aligned with Fred Hutch’s extraordinary mission of providing hope and finding successful treatments for our patients so they live long and happy lives,” Tran said. 

Her first patient’s lasting impact

Tran’s career began in 1990 after she graduated that same year with a Bachelor’s of Science degree in nursing from the University of Washington. She wanted to work with children and was thrilled that her first role was working with inpatient pediatric patients who were receiving a blood and marrow transplant (BMT) at Fred Hutch.

She has vivid memories of her first patient, an infant whose grandparents were her guardians and caregivers. 

“I was her primary nurse and felt privileged to have been a part of it, to help the grandparents and to know that they accepted my assistance in their grandbaby’s care,” Tran said. “I remember them pulling her around the floor in a little wagon. She did so well and was sweet, did not cry much and took her oral medications like a champ.”

The infant’s disease unfortunately came back, requiring more treatment that did not have a successful outcome, and she died. Afterward, Tran was touched by the fact that the child’s grandparents returned to Fred Hutch to express their gratitude not only for the clinical care the child received, but the overall support they received as a family.

“She has been in my heart ever since,” Tran said of the infant. 

A new way to help patients

Tran continued working with children, and eventually adults who were receiving a BMT, doing this work for nearly a decade. As a BMT nurse, she provided comprehensive nursing care to patients as they went through treatment, such as administering chemotherapy, managing side effects, monitoring for infections or graft-vs.-host disease and offering emotional support throughout the transplant process. She not only supported her patients but their families and caregivers as well. 

All along the way, she felt fortunate to learn and grow with guidance from many great preceptors, mentors and colleagues at Fred Hutch. Tran said these people were pivotal, setting her on course where she grew into a leader, having the knowledge, skills and confidence to accept opportunities that might otherwise have been unreachable.

Growth and gaining new responsibilities

From that role on, she continued to take on more positions with more responsibilities within Fred Hutch. Due to her tenacity and drive, by 2016, she had become both supervisor for Fred Hutch’s infusion operations and interim Clinical Trials Unit supervisor. 

She credits her motivation and dedication to her work to her family. When she was a young child, she and her family fled Vietnam and immigrated to the U.S. in 1975.

“We came over with almost nothing and needed to start a whole new life. My parents didn’t have jobs and we didn’t speak English,” she said. “I admire my folks and am so thankful for everything they did, and how they stressed how important it is to get a higher education and follow your dreams.”

Tran also spent two years as the clinical research nurse coordinator for Fred Hutch’s Phase 1 Clinical Trials Program. This work included educating patients, families and caregivers on disease processes, clinical trial treatment, adverse effects and symptom management. She also worked closely with primary investigators, research staff, pharmacists and other interdisciplinary teams to ensure study protocols are implemented with accuracy. 

Appreciative of support all along the way

Today, as a nurse manager at Fred Hutch at EvergreenHealth, a role she took on in 2021, she supervises a team of about 60 staff including registered nurses, licensed practical nurses and medical assistants who provide a variety of infusion and clinical care services for patients.  In addition to ensuring clinic services run optimally, she also is continually seeking new and better ways to support patients. One goal is to help grow patient access to clinical trials at Fred Hutch community sites, including the clinic at EvergreenHealth.

Tran said after more than three decades, Fred Hutch has had an enormous impact not only on her career, but on her life.

“I would never be here if I didn’t have all these amazing Fred Hutch staff to help me through,” she said. “They are like my second family and helped me grow into a successful oncology nurse and leader.”