Lynn Toth helps pass Delaware bill to mandate healthier school lunches

New challenges have become a way of life for Lynn Toth, a doctoral student at the University of Portland, located about 3,000 miles from her home in Milton.

Toth balances her daily routine as a nurse practitioner, a student, and a loving grandmother. Now, she can add health policymaker to her expanding list.

Recently, Toth helped pass a Delaware bill that eliminated trans fat in school lunches. The bill, which was passed by both the Delaware House of Representatives and Senate, is currently awaiting the signature of Gov. Jack Markell.

“I am an advocate because no one understands how trans fat can destroy children’s lives,” Toth said. “I see people every day with massive strokes, and I want to make an impact.”

Her quest to create positive change in Delaware surprisingly started across the country in the state of Oregon. Three years ago, Toth entered the doctor of nursing practice program at the University of Portland in Oregon.

“I was drawn to the University of Portland because of the integrated health program,” Toth said. “People laugh at me because I travel across the country for school, but that program is really what attracted me here.”

The University of Portland DNP program, which began in summer 2008, prepares nurses for the highest level of clinical nursing practice by awarding a professional doctorate degree. The program consists of classes, research, and online forums.

“Every year I think that I can do all of it because of the background and the information I have,” Toth said. “Every semester it is very challenging, but you just really have to do it.”

A University of Portland class prompted Toth to pursue a change in Delaware’s Legislature. “We were given an assignment in health policy class and I called up the lobbyist from the American Heart Association to see what they were working on,” Toth said. “I read the report and I just started talking to people who could make a difference.”

Soon after, Toth and the AHA were lobbying in Washington, D.C., and speaking with dieticians, staff members and committees to ban trans fat from school lunches. Four months later, the bill passed in the state of Delaware.

“This whole thing really taught me that I can be a leader and speak to what is right,” Toth said. “I always saw myself as shy and not outspoken, but school has made a difference in that it has give me the voice to be a leader.”

This was not Toth’s first time changing health policy in Delaware. In 2008, she was on the committee that developed criteria to help Delaware hospitals become stroke certified. Now, all but one hospital in Delaware has met the stroke certification criteria.

With her busy lobbying schedule in Delaware and in Washington, D.C., and her jobs as stroke coordinator and heart failure coordinator at Beebe Medical Center in Lewes, Toth has continued her education at the University of Portland.

Toth has traveled from Delaware to Oregon once a month for three years to attend classes at the University of Portland. Before Toth would leave for her cross-country school trip, she had to log hours in for work as well as check in on her patients.

Toth has spent nights in airports, been stranded in New York City and has dealt with numerous medical emergencies as a nurse practitioner while she made her monthly cross-country commute.

“I could really write a book about all of this,” Toth said. “It has been one adventure after another.” She will graduate next May from the University of Portland.

As for the future, Toth plans to finish school and continue making positive change happen in Delaware.

“Right now I need to get through school,” Toth said. “I can survive these next 10 months; I just have to be present for it minute by minute.”