Spirit of Neuroscience Nursing Photo Contest
Each year AANN hosts a photo contest to which neuroscience nurses are invited to submit pictures of colleagues, patients, and families.
2026 Spirit of Neuroscience Nursing Photo Contest Criteria
Capture pictures of your colleagues, patients, and families to submit to the AANN Spirit of Neuroscience Nursing photo contest. Your photo will be displayed on AANN's Facebook page during AANN's Neuroscience Nursing Annual Conference where members and attendees will vote for their favorite images. The member whose photo receives the most votes will win a complimentary conference registration to the 2027 Neuroscience Nursing Annual Conference.
Submission Requirements
- Photo should convey the spirit of neuroscience nursing.
- Submissions should be in electronic (JPEG, TIF, GIF) format.
- A short description of no more than 50 words (including all photo subjects' names and genders) must accompany each photo submission.
- A signed permission from each person (patient, family, or nurse) in each photo must accompany the submission.
- All submissions become property of AANN and will be widely shared throughout AANN media, including AANN Neuroscience News.
- One submission per person
- Send all submissions to info@aann.org by Friday, February 27, 2026.
2026 Photo Contest Winner
Congratulations to Andrea Stoll, MSN, AGACNP-BC, CCNS, CCRN for submitting the winning photo, “Quiet Courage.” Andrea has won a free registration to the 2027 Annual Conference in Anaheim, CA.
Pictured: Brandon Estep and family
Photo Caption: Brandon Estep is a young father of four whose life changed the day he was diagnosed with a grade 4 astrocytoma—an aggressive, life-altering brain tumor that threatened not only his future, but his ability to move, work, and father the way he always had. To remove the tumor, his neurosurgeon performed the unthinkable resecting his entire left motor cortex. Clinically, the expectation was clear: he should not have been able to move his right leg again. Yet neuroscience nursing is rooted in the belief that the brain can surprise us, and that healing is more than anatomy. Through relentless rehabilitation, skilled interdisciplinary care, steadfast encouragement, and a refusal to surrender to statistics, he relearned how to move. Step by step, with therapists and nurses who believed in possibility, he rewired what medicine said was lost. Today he walks with a cane—each stride a testament to neuroplasticity, resilience, and hope.
But his recovery is more than motor function. It is the quiet courage of showing up for his four children, volunteering at their school events, planning family milestones, and dreaming forward despite the weight of a grade 4 diagnosis. He refuses to let astrocytoma define him; instead, he weaves it into a larger narrative of strength, faith, and purpose. In him, we see the spirit of neuroscience nursing: advocating when odds feel heavy, educating with honesty and compassion, believing in recovery when outcomes seem fixed, and walking alongside patients and families through uncertainty. His tumor is part of his story—but it does not get the final word. Brandon does.
*Consent for taking, publication, and use of this photograph is on file.