Name: Melissa Trinkle
Title: LTC Supervisor
Tenure: 3 Months
Hobbies: Her husband, two daughters, skiing, rock climbing, and other types of outdoor activities.

Melissa Trinkle has lived a full life. She’s had three different careers, all of which she’s loved. She’s a
wife, a mother, a friend. She is also the LTC Supervisor at Crook County Medical Services District and it’s a job she’s wanted since she was a child.

“When I was a kid, one of the things I wanted to be was a nurse,” Trinkle said. “My dad was an X-Ray
Technician; that was his career. And so, I grew up with him and went into work with him and things like that. And he was always interested in science, and so was I. So that’s one of the things I wanted to be, a nurse. And my mom, of course, being the ambitious mom that she was said ‘No, you’ve gotta be a doctor!”

Trinkle didn’t end up a doctor but, before becoming a nurse, she did work as a teacher.
She also joined the Air Force, which is where she met her husband. In fact, it was her husband who would eventually convince her to go back to school to become a nurse.

“When I got out, my career in the Air Force wasn’t anything that translated to the civilian world,” Trinkle said. “So, because I already had a degree, one in history and one in teaching, I looked into going back for one of those.”

She didn’t end up doing that, however. Instead, she remembered what she wanted to be when she was a little girl. She became a nurse.

Trinkle legitimately enjoys helping people. She cares about people. That’s how she was in the Air Force, and it’s how she is now, in her current career.

Trinkle has been a nurse for 10 years. Her first job out of school was working at a rural hospital in Tennessee. She also worked for 8 years as a nurse in Minnesota. But in November of 2022, Trinkle began working for Crook County Medical Services.

“I’m new to the job and I’m new to the state of Wyoming,” Trinkle laughed. “My husband is from up north and we’ve been married for 16 years. And the entire time we’ve been married, he talked about moving out west. He’s had this obsession with moving out west. So, we did.”

Trinkle began looking for nursing jobs in Wyoming, and she came across a position with the Crook County Medical Services District. She interviewed once via video and once in person. A week later, she was offered the job.

“I’m a supervisor for long term care,” she said. “It’s actually a new position. In short, I’m like an Assistant to the Director of Nursing. So whatever she needs.” It’s a big job, and it’s one that she doesn’t take lightly.

“I don’t have a lot of experience with the surrounding hospitals, but I would say that CCMSD has an incredibly welcoming environment,” Trinkle shared. “From day one, I’ve been super impressed with the staff. I came
from the Mayo Clinic, which is renowned for its care, but here it’s just as good. The people here have just
been so great in so many ways. They really care about their patients. That’s very obvious. And I think that’s something that you may not find in other areas, and I think that’s something that draws our residents to us – it’s our reputation for providing that type of care.”

CCMSD has built that reputation through years of patient dedication. They are truly a patient-first medical clinic, and that mindset reverberates through the walls at each of their clinics. It’s one of the things that first drew Trinkle to the job in the first place. The other thing was the job’s incredibly fast pace.

“My favorite part of the job is that there’s always something different,” she said. “I never know what I’m going to walk into. I may have a to-do list for the day and I may never touch it because something else comes up, or somebody needs something else done. And for me, that’s a lot of fun. I don’t know what the day is going to bring, or the challenges I’m going to face, or how it’s going to end up.”

That’s part of the fun of the job and it’s what keeps Trinkle coming back, day after day. Though she’s only
been a part of CCMSD for a few months, she already feels like she’s a part of the family. And as she grows in her career and learns and evolves and gets even better, she can look back on that little girl who wanted to be a nurse all those years ago. And she can say, “You did it, kid. We did it.”