Sharon Ann Cotter, EMT-P, RN, FNP

Sharon (Walsh) Cotter passed away on April 8, 2019 at home with her husband, Tim, and her loving dogs at her side. She was born July 27, 1951 in Providence. Daughter of the late Helen (Brown) Walsh, niece of the late Robert Brown, and sister to Dennis Walsh of Warwick. After graduating high school, Sharon entered the Air Force as a medical specialist. During her time in the military she earned a Bachelor’s degree in Biology and took nursing and medical classes which would propel her future career After leaving the military, Sharon worked for many years for the Providence Journal as a district manager. During this time, Sharon obtained her Emergency Medical Technician License, and started volunteering her time and services for the North Kingstown Ambulance Corps, which later became Exeter Rescue, Swansea Ambulance Corps, and eventually to her town of Foster after moving there in 1988. In 1991, Sharon graduated from the Saint Joseph School of Nursing as a Registered Nurse. She began working at Kent County Memorial Hospital working in the Intermediate Cardiac Intensive Care Unit, which would lead her to her true passion of being an Emergency Room nurse. Continuing her education, Sharon earned her Bachelor’s degree in Nursing from Rhode Island College, and her Master’s Degree as a Family Nurse Practitioner from Quinnipiac University in 2004. Sharon's love and passion for helping people and for education led her to join the Rhode Island Disaster Medical Assistance Team (DMAT), and the RI Medical Reserve Corps (MRC), where she deployed numerous times to parts of the country to aid people who were devastated by natural disasters such as Hurricane Katrina, as well as countless number of local detachments covering large events such as the Air Show, and the music festival in Newport. With the MRC, Sharon would coordinate and run annual flu vaccine clinics in Foster and the surrounding area. Sharon's dedication to the town and the people of Foster ran very deep. Volunteering on the rescue for nearly 30 years, serving for 12 of those years as the commander of the rescue. She constantly wrote grants to obtain advanced equipment to better serve the people of the town. She was also very dedicated to educating and training EMTs to better serve the town, as well as teaching CPR to anyone that wanted to learn. Above all, she was dedicated to her family and to all of her dogs. Funeral Friday at 9:15 a.m. from the Winfield & Sons Funeral Home, 571 West Greenville Road, Scituate, followed by a Mass of Christian Burial at St. Joseph Church, Danielson Pike, Scituate at 10:30 a.m. Burial with Military Honors will be held at the Rhode Island Veterans Memorial Cemetery, Exeter. Calling Hours will be held Thursday 4:00 - 8:00 p.m. . In lieu of flowers donations in her memory may be made to either the Foster Ambulance Corps, 22 Mt. Hygeia Rd., Foster, RI 02825 or the East Greenwich Animal Protection League, P.O. Box 184, East Greenwich, RI 02818

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Sharon Ann Cotter, EMT-P, RN, FNP

April 8, 2019