VISITING NURSING ASSOCIATION history

In fact, our organization had its beginnings in 1880, an era when doctors and hospitals were only for the rich.

Founded in 1885, the VNA of Western New York was the first visiting nursing organization in America.

Founded by community volunteers in 1889 as the Denver Flower Mission dedicated to comforting Denver’s sick and poor, Visiting Nurse Association was Colorado’s first home healthcare agency.

VNA’s roots go back to 1890, when Jane Addams and other courageous and pioneering women founded The Visiting Nurse Association of Chicago (VNA-C). VNA-C employed its own nurses and other health professionals to provide care to the underprivileged.

Elizabeth Coe Marshall died just a few years later, in 1892, but by that time the VNA of Western New York was firmly established.

The Mission reformed as “The Albany Guild for the Care of the Sick Poor” in 1896, and the following year, incorporated as a 501 (c) (3) not-for-profit corporation.

Our organization began with a meeting of volunteers on June 24, 1912, at Brookdale Farm in Lincroft, NJ. The young organization set out to improve prison conditions and achieve a more humane approach to public assistance.

By 1918, the agency adopted the name Monmouth County Organization for Social Service (MCOSS).

To better reflect its purpose, the agency’s name was again changed in 1937 to the “Visiting Nurse Association of Albany.” By then, the charge for a nursing visit had gone up to $1, and the charge for attendance at the delivery of a baby was $5.

An active Southern Monmouth Auxiliary opened the doors of the Thrift Shop in Manasquan in 1960.

By the early 1970’s, VNA nurses had offices in three low-income housing communities in Arbor Hill.

In 1976, the VNA moved to its present, much larger home, at 35 Colvin Avenue in Albany.

To give the agency a vehicle to raise money for these unfunded services, the not-for-profit VNA Foundation was established in 1984.

In an effort to make the organization’s identity clear in both Middlesex County and Monmouth County, the agency’s trustees voted in December, 1993 to adopt the name Visiting Nurse Association of Central Jersey (VNACJ).

In 2008, VNA of Central Jersey joined with Visiting Nurse and Hospice Services and partnered with Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital to enhance and expand home and community care options for the residents of Mercer, Somerset, Union, Burlington, Gloucester, and Camden counties.

In 2009, Essex Valley Visiting Nurse Association, serving residents in Essex and Hudson counties, joined the VNACJ family.

In 2011, VNA of Central Jersey, its affiliates and partners joined together as Visiting Nurse Association (VNA) Health Group and added, its most recent member VNA of Englewood.

In 2014, the agency began providing services in eight additional Capital Region counties.