Angela Edgar, Northside Hospital Cherokee

Angela Edgar was a teenager when she first saw the power of nursing.

Her mother had been diagnosed with acute myelocytic leukemia and traveled to UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles for one of the country’s first bone marrow transplants. Edgar watched closely as nurses cared for her mother with skill and kindness.

“Their humanity and their compassion really stayed with me,” she said.

Her mother died when she was 17. But the nurses who stood beside her family during those final months left an imprint that would shape the course of her life.

Four decades later, Edgar has built a career defined by the same steadiness and compassion she witnessed as a teenager. Colleagues at Northside Hospital Cherokee say she is a quiet, respected nursing leader.

Edgar — the hospital’s director of patient services, critical care and emergency services — has been honored with the 2026 AJC Nurse Leader Award, presented by Kaiser Permanente, as part of the Celebrating Nurses awards program. She was presented the award Thursday during a ceremony at Curate Event Space.

Co-worker Katie Duckett nominated Edgar for the award, saying she is a leader whose influence extends far beyond titles.

“She is quite simply the GI Jane of nursing leadership — resilient, focused and always mission-ready,” Duckett said.

She said Edgar has an unusual ability to guide teams through challenges.

“She navigates complex situations with remarkable clarity and confidence, bringing calm to chaos and direction to uncertainty,” Duckett said.

Edgar’s path into leadership was not something she initially planned.

Born in Michigan and raised in South Florida, she explored her interests in health care while participating in the Health Occupation Students of America program in high school. While a graduate RN waiting to take her licensure board examination, she was put in charge of a 52-bed hospital unit.

“They saw some leadership skills in me that I did not appreciate because I was trying to learn to be a nurse,” Edgar said.

After earning a bachelor’s degree in nursing from Florida International University and later a master’s degree in nursing administration from Indiana State University, she worked as a bedside nurse in critical care for about 12 years and did another 12 years in the cardiac catheterization lab.

Leadership opportunities followed: assistant nurse manager, chief flight nurse, clinical coordinator and nurse manager. Then she advanced into a director’s position at Northside Hospital Cherokee, where she’s worked for nearly two decades.

Even now, Edgar describes herself as something of a reluctant leader.

“Leadership opportunities have found me,” she said.

One of the most complex challenges of her career came when the hospital moved from an aging facility nine years ago to a newly built hospital 3 miles away.

The task involved transferring every patient and piece of medical equipment from one building to the other — a massive undertaking requiring months of planning and coordination. She even had to loop in staff with the hospital pharmacy and the federal Drug Enforcement Administration so narcotics could be moved from one building to another.

When moving day finally arrived, the hospital transferred patients in an organized convoy of ambulances and clinical teams.

“We had everybody from A to B 3 miles away in an EMS caravan,” she said. “We moved about eight patients an hour.”

The operation took roughly eight hours and required coordination with emergency medical services, police, fire departments and hospital staff.

“I’m really proud we had no patient safety issues,” Edgar said.

Duckett said moments like that illustrate what sets Edgar apart.

“She possesses the rare ability to make complex, high-stakes decisions with clarity and confidence, while never losing sight of the human beings at the center of those decisions — patients, families and team members alike,” she said.

Edgar said her approach to leadership has always been rooted in one guiding principle.

“To me, nurse leadership means supporting and empowering others while always keeping the patient at the center of every decision,” she said.