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At 7:12 AM (CDT) on June 14, 2014 in Mississippi, a long-time member and ardent supporter of our profession passed away.  Jerry Bridgers was a man who would give you the clothes off his back if you needed them.  He was a strong advocate for every piece of legislation this profession has brought before Congress and his passion for getting people involved was unmatched.  Jerry was a man of 70+ years who I consider one of my very best friends.  We met at an AARC PACT meeting in Dallas and became friends immediately.  He was more than 20 years my senior, but I felt like and was treated like a brother.  Jerry and I would speak weekly.  His infamous 7:30 AM calls to my house on Sundays were met with my wife answering the phone because Jerry could not remember I went to church early on Sundays.  

In your life, you meet many people and most will not even make you turn your head.  Jerry with his beaming smile and jolly laugh knew how to live life.  He had a hard life early on, mostly by his own design.  With the love and support of his family and many RTs from the Mississippi and Louisiana area, Jerry righted his life and found God.  His passion for this profession could be seen in how he talked about it.  He knew history of things that went on not only in his hometown and in state, but he could tell you stuff about national respiratory events without having to think about it.  Those of us who served in the AARC House of Delegates always knew when something was brewing by how red and animated Jerry would get.  Then we'd see the Mississippi placard go up and then he'd stride to the microphone.  Everyone knew Jerry would command the microphone for quite some time, but when he spoke he spoke from the heart and always had a message....even if he used 2, 3, 4, 5...stories to get the point across.  If you wanted to hear how Respiratory Therapy was practiced in the early days, all you had to do was have Jerry tell a story from his early days as an oxygen orderly.  His passion for patient care was still there even after he retired about 3 years ago.  He would always tell me, the RTs today need to know it is not just about giving breathing treatments; they need to help the patient and even the nurse.

Jerry spoke here in CT one year and he did something that impressed me.  He was not a polished speaker by any means and to the end; he maybe did one presentation using PowerPoint.  He still has a binder filled with overheads that he would use in his talks.  However, I digress, so back to CT.  He started his talk by asking the students to stand up.  When they did, he stated to the rest of the room "this is your future, this is who is going to fill in the gaps as we all begin to retire, you need to give them a hand, they are our future and they need to know we appreciate them".  It was powerful because Jerry loved the RTs from the old timers to the newly minted and he showed it.

In 2004, Jerry was awarded the AARC House of Delegates "Delegate of the Year" award.  The man was speechless when he was given the award (well, maybe not speechless because I believe he gave a speech from the dais).   Our profession honored Jerry when he was awarded "lifetime membership".  The man after however many years was not only given life membership, but he never had to pay dues again.  You know what he did for the first few years.  You guessed it; he paid for someone’s membership each year around the time his dues would have been done.  I am not sure how long he kept that up, but you see the point.

On Wednesday, June 11, 2014, I spoke to Jerry for what would be the last time.  I could tell he was struggling to breath and his ability to speak was limited to 2-3 words at a time before he had to take a breath.  It broke my heart but I needed him to know that although I was not there, he was in my heart and my prayers were with him.  He tried hard to tell me what was going on, but at one point his voice trailed off and there was silence and deep breaths.  I knew he fell asleep, but in the background, I heard Clarice his wife laughing and poking him to tell him to wake up and talk to Frank.  He did and son of a gun, he started talking right about at the point he left the conversation to take the short siesta.  I got the one chance to get a zinger in on him and I got a weak but ever comforting Jerry laugh.  He then told me something that now I feel was a sign; he said, "Frank, I'm ready.  I'm tired and I'm ready".  Jerry always told me that you have to be good with the Lord.  He was, and I believe he will be with the Lord.

So why am I writing this?  There are many who know Jerry, but there are many that do not.  Jerry Bridgers was a respiratory therapist and loved it.  He also was a staunch advocate who took pride in going to Washington DC every year to work on advancing our legislative agenda.  Jerry missed the first trip this past March/April.  Our profession is at a critical junction with the Affordable Care Acts provisions on quality and readmission.  We're at another junction of being a relevant profession for years to come.  We can't let Jerry down by allowing our profession to be attacked and our patients to not have access to respiratory therapists in ALL care settings.  We must continue to promote respiratory care as a solution to the health care issues before us.  We need to advance the profession to the next level with higher educational goals such as Bachelor's Degree entry and advanced practice RTs with Master's Degrees and higher.  Finally, we need to advocate for our patients and our profession by working to stop government from trying to deregulate us. We need to work to get better access for our patients through legislation that brings RTs into care settings outside the hospital.  Finally, we need to bring more people into our profession so when we decide to retire or in the case of this blog, we lose a valued RT like Jerry Bridgers...we have the life force that will continue to provide respiratory therapy.

I lost a very good friend today; we lost a valuable member of our profession who was willing to fight to see it advance.  Let us not allow his fight to die with him; we need to take up the cause.  I for one will try to live the lessons Jerry taught me and during my Presidency, I will work tirelessly for this profession and our patients.  The first goal will be to get our legislation passed in Washington.  We owe it to Jerry and as he would say to me "Leroy, you owe it to your patients!”