Leslie Cook is our Education Coordinator.
Leslie Cook has been a regional forensic nurse examiner with the Fort Wayne Sexual Assault Treatment Center since 1996 providing comprehensive care to hundreds of patients in and around Allen County. When not providing patient care Ms. Cook is highly visible within the communities of northeast Indiana providing in-services, presentations, and lectures to students, professionals and the lay population on a variety of topics regarding sexual assault. In addition Ms. Cook is also responsible for coordination and implementation of the Adult/Adolescent and Pediatric SART/SANE classroom training offered to nurses, physicians, members of law enforcement, advocates and attorneys throughout the United States. Ms. Cook also serves as a clinical preceptor/mentor to newly trained nurses and provides forensic nursing expertise and consultation to a variety of committees at a local, state and regional level.
She received her Adult/Adolescent SANE training at Hillcrest Medical Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1995 and her Pediatric SANE training through an advanced course taught by Ms. Jamie Ferrell in Fort Wayne, Indiana in addition to a fellowship with Dr. Judy Guinn from Children’s Hospital in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1998/1999. Ms Cook obtained her SANE-A board certification in June 2003 and her SANE-P certification in May 2007. Her nursing background includes critical care where she spent nearly 15 years in the emergency room/level ll trauma center at Parkview Memorial Hospital in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
In 1998 Ms. Cook explored other opportunities in Forensics and was appointed Coroner of Adams County, Indiana. She was the first Registered Nurse in the county’s history to hold this position and has been with the office since. In 2016, Ms. Cook was elected into her 4th term as Coroner after having served as an appointed Deputy Coroner for four years. She is certified in Medical Legal Death Investigation by the State of Indiana Coroner’s Training Board. Under the Coroner system, Indiana was the first state to require such certification for Coroner’s and Deputy Coroner’s. Ms Cook is a member of the International Association of Forensic Nurses and served on the committee to draft educational guidelines for the Forensic Nurse Death Investigator. She is also a Board member of the Indiana State Coroners Association where she served as Secretary/Treasurer, Vice-President, & President. In 2014, Ms. Cook was appointed to the Indiana’s Coroner’s Training Board by Governor Mike Pence. She serves as an adjunct instructor on the Indiana Coroner’s Training Board.
