February 2018
Caitlyn
Foley
,
RN
9S Neurology
The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
Philadelphia
,
PA
United States

 

 

 

When I arrived 2 weeks ago, I was relieved I was with the best doctors to treat my son who went from being healthy 7-year-old to a kid with sepsis. About a week in we ended up with Cait as our nurse one day. At the end of the day, I hoped we would have her again. Lucky for us, she was back multiple times and she made my days so much better. She isn't just handing out meds and taking vitals. She was observing my challenges and my son's challenges and jumped through hoops to fix all of them. She was never afraid to speak up during rounds to offer suggestions based on her knowledge of my son. He had to take so many meds PO and struggled every day. It took 3 hours one morning and 3.5 hours at night. Needless to say, I was crying over this because I felt I was torturing him. She heard about the night struggle and in rounds suggested trying crushing meds, meltaways, etc. Doctors agreed to order these kinds and my problems were resolved. My son didn't have to see me crying over this and didn't spend many hours fighting over meds being threatened with a feeding tube or new IV. She quickly acted on a weekend seeing there was a change in his urine that I would have overlooked and doctors are not coming in to check. As a mother of a severely ill child, my peace of mind was having Cait looking after him. She had to give him a muscular shot and his anxiety was high. My son is a fighter and headstrong yet there was an obvious trust he had for her. She is beyond amazing and is responsible for his best days here, and mine too.