Ruth Mullins-Berg - 8/23/43 - 6/27/20

It is with great sadness that we mourn the passing of a remarkable woman, and a founding member of NAPNAP, Ruth Mullins-Berg.

Ruth G. Mullins was born in Nova Scotia, Canada on August 23, 1943, and died of renal failure June 27,  2020.  Her parents were Salvation Army Ministers stationed in Nova Scotia. When Ruth was 2 years old, she and her mother moved to Ontario, Canada after her father’s death.  They moved to New York to became US citizens and then moved to Yuma, Arizona, where Ruth spent her early childhood and her mother served as a Salvation Army Minister to a small, poor congregation.

Ruth went to Texas Women’s University where she met her husband, Buddy. They moved to Southern California and Ruth completed her BSN degree at CSULB.  Ruth went on to obtain her MSN and PNP from UCLA and later a PhD from Columbia Pacific University.  She became a CSULB nursing faculty member in 1973 and was hired to start their Pediatric Nurse Practitioner Program.  She served as the Director of the CSULB PNP program for twenty-five years. She described her work in educating PNPs as the most professionally rewarding time in her academic career.

Ruth was a founding member of NAPNAP and served as its President-elect, President, and Past from 1989 to 1992. She also was active in the formation of both the Los Angeles and Orange County Chapters of NAPNAP and enjoyed seeing and catching up with graduates of her PNP program at local and national meetings. Ruth and Bobbie Nelms wrote a pediatric textbook on growth and development. They then launched NAPNAP’s Journal of Pediatric Health Care. Bobbie served as Editor and Ruth as the Associate Editor. It was a twenty-two-year collaboration of kindred spirits working to promote the role of PNPs through scholarly publications. 

Ruth’s husband, Buddy, and her eldest daughter predeceased her.  She is survived by her daughter, Catherine Mullins, her son, Lenny Mullins, and her husband, Ben Berg.