Yisel Ruiz

I came to this country as an immigrant when I was almost [a certain age] and had to learn the language, which was very difficult. Despite originally studying to become a classical piano player, a friend who was going to school to become a nurse told me about her experience, and it sounded like something I would love to do, so I started going to school for nursing. I worked as a bedside nurse in many disciplines and specialties before becoming a nurse practitioner in 2020. I started working in vascular specialty, then wanted to do aesthetics, so I got a bunch of certifications to become an aesthetics nurse practitioner. After that, I became a certified wound specialist. Today I treat complicated wounds - not regular wounds, but the difficult ones where some people have had wounds for 4 years or more - and I also do aesthetics. Education is probably the thing our population needs the most in both specialties. In aesthetics, social media is messing with people's minds, and I have people asking me to look like an Instagram filter, so I do a lot of education about being beautiful in your own way. In wound care, I treat the whole person and the underlying condition, not just the wound. What I find most rewarding is that I get to heal people and change how people feel when it comes to appearance too. Physical beauty is important - you have to be healthy to feel good, but you also have to look your best to feel good.