Christine is a nurse who I have gotten the pleasure to know in the last 8 months as the Manager of the unit. Christine is a newer nurse to the profession and while she may struggle a little with self-confidence, she always strives to deliver excellent care. She demonstrates exceptional clinical skills every day while caring for her patients. She develops caring relationships with all patients and families and is very respectful. Christine is engaged in the practice of nursing and is always bringing great ideas forward to me. She definitely lives our Mission, Vision, and Values every day but never gives herself enough credit.
One evening Christine was caring for an acutely ill patient who was not a typical patient on our unit. It is an unspoken belief that "no one dies in Observation." Christine stuck by those words while caring for this acutely ill patient. She delivered excellent clinical care with determination. The patient's condition quickly deteriorated and Christine recognized this and jumped into action. The patient suffered cardiac arrest and was resuscitated with the efforts of the entire team that day, but with the lead of Christine. This patient spent months recovering and since then, has made cards for the unit thanking us for her "second chance at life." If it wasn't for Christine and the entire Observation Team, this woman may have never gotten a "second chance." She recently came back to the unit looking for Christine to thank her in person. Our secretary wrote the following email:
A former patient of yours stopped by today with a card and dropped off some cookies (which I left on breakroom table). She wanted to thank the nurse who "brought her back to life". I had to go and search the old breakdown sheets and you were her nurse! She said she died and you brought her back to life. She had the "flu" along with pneumonia and a whole slew of other problems. She ended up spending 2-3 weeks in ICU and had a very long recovery at home after that. She said she was finally able to mow the lawn this week for the first time; as well as drive a car again! She is forever grateful to you for being such a wonderful nurse and said she is sorry that she was not able to come and thank you earlier. I gave her your name and she said she may give you a call sometime as she would love to take you to lunch!
Thank you, Christine, for being a St. Joseph's Health nurse, Living Our Values every day, and delivering only the best [compassionate] care, as a DAISY Nurse should!