BAMC adds dedicated nurse navigator in Nuclear Medicine Clinic

Story by Lori Newman

Brooke Army Medical Center Public Affairs

JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas, March 5, 2025 – The Nuclear Medicine Clinic at Brooke Army Medicine Center added a nurse navigator to assist patients and physicians with specialized treatments.

Samantha Green, registered nurse, will provide patient education, work with physicians to organize treatment plans and run the theranostic cancer treatment program at BAMC.

“The experience I get here working with these patients far exceeds anything else I could have done in any other field,” she said.

Theranostics refers to a medical approach that combines diagnostic imaging with targeted therapy. It involves using radioactive substances to both identify and treat diseases, such as cancer.

“The field of nuclear medicine is undergoing a big change,” said Army Col. Nathan McWhorter, chief of nuclear medicine. “There are more and more theranostic treatments that are being developed.”

McWhorter explained that the field of nuclear medicine is transforming from a diagnostic service to both diagnostic and treatment services. “There are some projections that say 10 years from now, theranostics will become close to half of your business,” he said.

“BAMC was the first hospital in the Department of Defense to perform a theranostic cancer treatment in 2018,” McWhorter added.

McWhorter said Green was a perfect choice for the position because of her initiative.

“Sam (Green) was the nurse on 6 East who took care of our patients,” he explained. “6 East is where we do all our inpatient nuclear medicine treatments. She is the one who wrote all the standard operating procedures for the nursing care of radioactive patients. So, she’s got a lot of experience. She knows this hospital.”

Green decided to become a nurse because her oldest son was born with a rare genetic condition.

“We were constantly in and out of hospitals and specialists’ offices,” she said. “I quickly learned that while doctors are essential, nurses are the lifeline for patients and families. I wanted to provide that meaningful, positive impact during what might be someone’s worst day.”

“Having worked with the nuclear medicine team while I was a nurse on the inpatient side of things, I was very excited to try something new with my career taking on this role,” Green said. “This is an advancing field within medicine where the role of nursing care is being shaped every day.”

“Being able to see patients regularly and establish relationships is rewarding,” she added. “Many patients travel a great distance to be treated here at BAMC because of the unique therapies that only we offer. Caring for these patients, many of whom are cancer patients, is incredibly rewarding. Having the opportunity to connect with them and support them at such a vulnerable time in their life reminds me of why I wanted to become a nurse.”

Another advantage to having Green in the Nuclear Medicine Clinic full-time is that many of the treatments that had to be done on the inpatient unit can now be done within the clinic, explained McWhorter.

“When we performed treatments, they all had to be done up on 6 East because we didn’t have a nurse down here (in the clinic),” he said. “Now we can do the vast majority of treatments here which saves the hospital in workload because any time you have a patient upstairs as an inpatient, the hospital is devoting a lot of additional resources for that care.”

McWhorter said he hopes this can be a model for other military treatment facilities within the Defense Health Agency.

“Our hope is not just to have a great capability for our patients here, we want to build a blueprint so that other hospitals within DHA can learn from what we’ve done and make it easier for them to implement a similar program to meet their needs,” he said. “BAMC’s cutting edge. We want to be the tip of the spear. If there’s something new that is coming, we want to do it here.”