After 18 years, U.S. Rep. Lois Capps of California uses the recent renewal by Congress of legislation that improves people’s access to high-quality care by nurses as a springboard to say goodbye. (Capps announced her plan to retire early last year.)

In a column on The Huffington Post, Capps writes of being co-author of the bipartisan Title VIII Nursing Workforce Reauthorization Act just passed by a House committee, and emphasizes that far from being “just a nurse,” as some said when she took office, she was able to accomplish more precisely because she came in to Congress as a public health nurse.  She writes, “Simply put: nurses have a critical voice that must be heard.”

Above: Congresswoman Capps speaks at a reception held in her honor at the Campaign for Action Summit 2015 in Washington, D.C. Photo by Carolina Kroon/©AARP