Jaymi Moody

The following is an e-mail that I received from an attending physician in the Emergency Department. The leadership that Jaymi exemplified in this critical situation was helpful to the nurses involved as well as the physicians. She is known to be resourceful and knowledgeable and goes out of her way to teach and lead the staff in the Emergency Department.

"Last Sunday morning, we had a very sick 8 week old in septic shock come into Red 5 with, as it turns out, a difficult airway requiring anesthesia to come down for assistance. She went up to the PICU shortly thereafter and has done well. When she arrived, Pam and Elizabeth quickly assessed the severity of her illness and were instrumental in initiating her resuscitation. Many other nurses assisted as well. In the flurry of activity, none of us thought to alert Jaymi, the Clinical Leader, about what was going on, though she did realize on her own mid-resuscitation. At the end of the shift, Jaymi took me aside and we talked about the case, and she let me know that she wished that she would have been called, by either the physicians or the nurses, about the patient so she could have been there earlier to help facilitate care. It had honestly not even crossed my mind at the time because my focus was solely on the patient, but she obviously would have been a great help (i.e. getting anesthesia, finding the correct size LMAs, etc.), and should have been alerted anyway simply because she was the CL. I really appreciated receiving her feedback in such a professional manner – particularly noted was the fact that she waited until the end of the shift when things had died down, and talked to me (and Elizabeth) privately. It was definitely something for me to learn from and it was great to debrief. In the future, whenever I have a sick patient, I will think to call the CL right away. Jaymi is an excellent example of what I think a CL ought to be and I’m so glad she came back to the ED.