Theresa Garnero: Diabetes Educator of the Year

Theresa Garnero was 8 years old when she decided she just might make it as a cartoonist. The news came in the form of a rejection slip. But since it came from Walt Disney, she knew she’d already hit the big leagues.

She also wanted to become a jazz pianist but was afraid of starving, so she went into something she could count on: nursing. Born and raised on the Monterey Peninsula — “I’m so local,” she says, “I was born at Community Hospital” — Garnero attended the Maurine Church Coburn School of Nursing at Monterey Peninsula College in 1987. A decade later, she completed her bachelor of nursing degree through the State University of New York, followed by her master of nursing degree two years later.

Upon retiring, the previous editor of Nursing Insight — a quarterly publication for Community Hospital nurses — tapped Garnero to be her successor. She also suggested that Garnero leave staff development and focus on education, prevention, and patient care in the field of diabetes.

It was a good move. This past August, Garnero was named Diabetes Educator of the Year by the American Association of Diabetes Educators (AADE), which includes approximately 10,000 certified diabetes educators across the
country.

Part of her success, she says, lies in her commitment to patient care and public education. The other part is how she does it. With humor and art and compassion.

When Nursing Insight called for illustrations to accompany the stories, Garnero rekindled her early proclivity for art and drew a few cartoons. And then a few more. And then more, many for other nursing magazines and most of them about
diabetes.

The result was DIABETease: A Lighter Look at the Serious Subject of Diabetes, a collection of 50 diabetes-related color cartoons that Garnero and now others use in the education and prevention of diabetes. For developing this“ original, outstanding, and effective educational tool,” Garnero also received the Allene van Son Diabetes Educator Award at the AADE annual meeting.

“I think it was my destiny to come over to diabetes,” Garnero says. “I’ve found my niche in my personal and my professional life. And now, with this national title behind me, boy am I fired up.”