Waynesboro, TN (June 1, 2017) – Nurse practitioners and nurse practitioner advocates, recipients of the prestigious American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) 2017 State Award for Excellence, will be honored at an awards ceremony and reception held during the AANP 2017

National Conference June 20-25, 2017, in Philadelphia, PA.  Stan Bevis, Fast Pace Founder and

CEO, of Collinwood, Tennessee will be among the recipients honored.

The State Award for Nurse Practitioner Excellence, founded in 1991, recognizes a nurse practitioner (NP) in a state who demonstrates excellence in practice. In 1993, the State Award for Nurse Practitioner Advocate was added to recognize the efforts of individuals who have made a significant contribution toward increasing awareness and recognition of NPs.

While a nursing student at Middle Tennessee State University, Fast Pace founder, Stan Bevis, witnessed the collapse and untimely death of his father. He performed CPR on him for 20 minutes while waiting for emergency services to arrive at his rural home. These events led Stan to the realization that his father’s death might well have been prevented with accessible and cost effective healthcare. The death of his father nagged at Stan. He had grown up in a household where on occasion his parents had to make the difficult choice between a visit to a doctor and providing food for the family, the same choices that he knew other families were faced with on a daily basis. After taking a position with Vanderbilt’s Lifelight, he realized that the need for convenient, affordable healthcare was not localized to his own hometown. Although he didn’t quite know it at the time, the plans for Fast Pace had begun to form. Stan would share his dream with a fellow nursing student, the woman who would later become his wife and partner, Winnette Painter. Winnette shared Stan’s dreams and supported the idea of making services available “after hours,” so that people wouldn’t have to make the choice between food and lost wages and the inconvenience of leaving work to sit for hours in a physician’s office. One of the reasons that Stan’s father and families like his didn’t always get much needed medical attention. Another part of the dream was affordability, pricing that made healthcare available to the uninsured and under served. On October 7, 2009, the dream became a reality when the doors to the first Fast Pace Urgent Care Clinic were opened in Collinwood,

Tennessee. During that period, there were many times when Stan and Winnette went without being paid to meet clinic expenses. As their own family grew, so did their Fast Pace family with the opening of a second clinic in Savanah and a partner by the name of Dr. Reams Powers. The Bevis – Powers family team shared the same vision and mission – to serve. With the addition of staff and

continued requests for clinic locations, rapid growth beyond anything that had initially been imagined

became a reality. They grew from two clinics to ten with locations in Selmer, Lexington, Fayetteville, Fairview, Centerville, Lewisburg, Lawrenceburg and Mt. Pleasant. As the business grew, so did the framework for future growth and development. The clinic has grown from its initial seven employees to more than 700 clinical staff and 47 locations across Tennessee and Kentucky with plans for future expansion. With expansion comes the convenience of being able to be treated at any of the Fast Pace locations without the hassle of transferring insurance and payment information or medical history.

The clinics are electronically linked so that if you have to be seen at a clinic miles from home your information is available to healthcare professionals on the spot. Though the growth continues, there is still very much the same “small town” feel. Each clinic is staffed by locals, and they also provide support staff – maintenance, landscaping, construction and cleaning crews. Each clinic supports the community through a membership in their local Chambers of Commerce and by sponsorships of everything from community events, to local charities, to sports teams, and clinic staff is encouraged

to volunteer wherever their interests lie.

The American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) is the largest professional membership organization for nurse practitioners (NPs) of all specialties. It represents the interests of more than 222,000 NPs, including approximately 72,000 individual members and 200 organizations, providing a unified networking platform and advocating for their role as providers of high-quality, cost-effective, comprehensive, patient-centered and personalized health care. The organization provides legislative leadership at the local, state and national levels, advancing health policy; promoting excellence in practice, education and research; and establishing standards that best serve NP patients and other health care consumers.

For more information, visit aanp.org.  To locate a nurse practitioner in your area, visit npfinder.com

With 47 locations across Tennessee and Kentucky, Fast Pace Urgent Care provides primary, walk- in and urgent care to the communities we serve. We provide treatments for a wide range of illnesses, injuries, and common conditions, as well as provide a variety of wellness, diagnostic and screening services. For more information visit: fastpaceuregentcare.com