BUSINESS PERSONNEL

EXECUTIVE OF YEAR: Nancy Blattner, left, accepted "Executive of the Year" award from Marge Phillips.

Leslie Hueter has joined the staff at Elite Travel Inc., 354 S. Silver Springs Road.

Hueter of Jackson has more than 20 years experience in customer service and has traveled worldwide.

Phillip D. Kelley of Perryville has joined Capital Insurance & Associates, 107 S. Broadview, in Cape Girardeau.

Kelley has more than 14 years in the insurance industry. He previously worked with the Lakenan Insurance Agency.

Angie Kester and Jacquie Hart have joined The Style Stop Impact, 2118 E. Jackson Blvd., Jackson, as hair stylists.

Kester of Friedheim and Hart of Cape Girardeau are graduates of Stage One, the Hair School in Cape Girardeau.

Kester and Hart specialize in design perming, design cutting and coloring techniques. They also work in cosmetic applications, manicures and facials.

Julie Sappington has joined Hospital Home Care, a home health-care agency at 631 Themis in Cape Girardeau.

Sappington, a registered nurse, has experience in pediatric nursing and is working toward a master's degree in rural family nursing at Southeast Missouri State University.

Hospital Home Care offers home nursing and therapy services in Cape Girardeau, Bollinger, Scott, Perry and Stoddard counties.

C. Gordon Younce has joined Keller Chevrolet Geo Chrysler Plymouth Dodge in Perryville as salesman.

Younce has more than 25 years experience in the automotive field.

Ruth A. McDonnell, registered nurse, has joined St. Francis Medical Center as the hospital's new head of cardiovascular services.

McDonnell comes to Cape Girardeau from Arizona, where she was director of cardiology services at Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center, a 550-bed facility in Phoenix. She previously served as director of invasive cardiology at Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center/Desert Samaritan Medical Center at Mesa, Ariz.

McDonnell earned her nursing diploma from the Finley Hospital School of Nursing in Dubuque, Iowa. She has a bachelor's degree in nursing from the University of Phoenix and master's degree in nursing management from the same school. She also holds a nursing administration certification.

The St. Francis Medical Center Marketing and Public Relations Department received five statewide marketing awards, including four firsts, during the Missouri Hospital Association's 1996 "Show Me Excellence" awards program at Tan-Tara-A.

Members of the St. Francis Marketing & Public Relations staff include Mary Spell, Jay Wolz, Mike Simmons, Debbi Vandeven, Mary Hearnes, Jamie Compas, Lou Hannaford and Rosa White.

The medical center received first-place awards in four categories -- advertising, for a series of ads for the Center for Health & Rehabilitation; special public relations project, for the Center for Health & Rehabilitation's open house; Internet communications, for the medical center's World Wide Web site; and special employee communications project, for a series of staff newsletters designed to help prepare employees for an accreditation visit by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations.

The "Spirit of St. Francis" employee newsletter received third place in the employee newsletter category.

Nancy Blattner was recently named "Executive of the Year" by Professional Secretaries International (PSI).

Blattner is director of writing assessment at Southeast Missouri State University.

Charlotte Craig, director of the Cape Girardeau County Health Department, will be guest speaker at the PSI meeting Tuesday.

The dinner meeting will be held at 6:30 p.m. at the Drury Lodge.

PSI represents members from a number of fields, including secretaries, executive/administrative assistants, information specialists and office manager. PSI meetings are open to the public. Additional information is available by calling Donna Heuer, 651-92232; Carole Heinbokel, 243-8182; or Carol Cannon, 651-2836.

David L. Hahs of Cape Girardeau has been named to the Million Dollar Round Table's (MDRT) 1996 Honor Roll.

The Honor Roll recognizes members who have qualified for MDRT 15 or more times based on life insurance sales performance. Hahs, one of only 5,420 Honor Roll qualifiers, is a 23-year MDRT member.

Hahs is a special agent with Northwestern Mutual Life, 1307 Mount Auburn Road.

Dr. Zenon M. Duda of Cape Girardeau recently attended a seminar, held at the Gillis W. Long Hansen Disease Center in Carville, La.

The seminar, hosted by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, was designed to increase recognition and treatment of Hansen's disease and the diabetic foot.

Duda has been in practice for 15 years. His office is located at Cape Foot Clinic, 1345 Mount Auburn Road. He also has a satellite office at Perryville.

Dr. Kyle Brost has been named to the Advisory Board of the University of Missouri-St. Louis School of Optometry.

The board provides a multi-faceted role to the university, including discussion of budgets, relations between the University and Missouri Optometric Association and guidance on educational requirement of current students to meet the ever-changing demands of the profession.

Brost, a 1987 graduate of UM-St. Louis School of Optometry, has offices at 37 Doctors' Park in Cape Girardeau, 519 N. Main in Perryville and Court Square in Fredericktown.

Richard L. Wilburn, formerly of Cape Girardeau, has been promoted to senior vice president, senior lending officer of the Mercantile Bank of Lebanon.

Wilburn has 20 years of lending and banking experienced. He served in various lending land management posts in the Farm Credit System before joining Mercantile Bank of Cape Girardeau in 1990.

He is a graduate of Southeast Missouri State University and the Graduate School of Commercial Lending in Norman, Okla. He is currently a student at the Graduate School of Banking at Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge.

Hugh E. Stone and Mati Stone of Personal Solutions, Practice of Psychoterapy, 1936 Broadway, recently attended a seminar at Memphis, Tenn.

The seminar was sponsored by the American Board of Certified Managed Care Providers for psychotherapists.

Victoria Babu, co-anchor of Fox 2 "News Early Morning" at KTVI-TV in St. Louis has received the Emmy award for the category of "Best Anchor," by the mid-America Chapter of the national Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

Babu, a graduate of Southern Illinois University-Carbondale, previously worked at KFVS-TV in Cape Girardeau.

Dr. Robert Kessinger of Cape Girardeau was guest speaker during a Kale Certification Residency program at Spartanburg, S.C.

Kessinger a Kale-certified instructor in specific chiropractic, is an executive member of the Kale International Research Council.

Kessinger operates a five-doctor specific chiropractic clinic at 1424 Kurre Lane in Cape Girardeau.

Dr. Julia Heath of Union County Counseling Services Inc. in Anna, Ill., is recipient of the 1996 Ellen T. Quinn Memorial Award, presented by the Illinois Association of Community Mental Health Agencies (IACMHA).

The IACMHA, which represents more than 100 community health centers, recognizes one agency each year that has demonstrated exemplary service to the mental health field.

The award was established for Ellen T. Quinn, who died during her tenure as president of the IACMHA.

Heath has been practicing psychiatry in rural Southern Illinois eight years. She also serves as faculty and adviser for Southern Illinois University-Carbondale School of Medicine.