John Scharf
September 2020
John
Scharf
,
BSN, RN
Medicine ICU
Parkland Health & Hospital System

 

 

 

You can often find John out on the unit taking the extra time to help his patient in the smallest ways, whether it be sitting there and holding their hand during their last breaths, or washing their hair when no one else has been able to take the time.
John Scharf joined the Medicine ICU team as an experienced nurse and has never looked back. He has become an integral part of the team. You can often find him out on the unit taking the extra time to help his patient in the smallest ways, whether it be sitting there and holding their hand during their last breaths, or washing their hair when no one else has been able to take the time. He truly puts the patient first and will always help others without question. He is the first to jump in during a code to make sure there are enough people in line to do compressions but is also able to stand back and teach a novice nurse how to handle the situation. He is often the calm in the storm. He will quickly agree to pick the assignment with the behavioral issue patient to relieve his teammates, and by the end of the day will be able to deescalate the patient and has prevented multiple BERT calls. He is an incredible nurse, fantastic team member, and we are very thankful he is a part of our team. The message below is an example of the feedback that we get from others in the interdisciplinary team on the care that he provides.
From an MRI technologist:
I wanted to give a great appreciation above and beyond just kudos to a nurse in MICU for being absolutely amazing! This nurse came down to MRI with a patient whose scans would take at least 1.5 hours. He amazed me with his gentle bedside manner and patience. The patient at times was difficult due to AMS and chronic illness amongst possibly other things. However, he didn't change in character or manner not even once. Honestly, there were times towards the end where I felt the patient had become somewhat mean but he remained stable and didn't let it bother him. He mentioned to me that the patient had possibly been through some tough times which reminded me to not focus on the difficulty now but what may have gotten the patient in need of our care. This warmed my heart to see during this current pandemic when people are just stressed and on edge because of change. I got to see a true servant at heart; someone who really has a heart for not only what he does but for other people. That encouraged me to keep serving and being kind because you don't know what the person or patient has gone through in their lifetime to put them in need of your care.