While responding to a code blue on 3East, the room was both demanding and emotional. There were multiple people in the room; doctors, respiratory therapists, LNAs, and nurses. As the team worked tirelessly to perform lifesaving efforts, the mother of the young patient entered the room. The patient's mother was overtaken with emotion and obviously extremely upset by the news she had just received, as well as the scene she was walking into. One of the doctors had briefed the patient's family outside the room, and the doctor running the cardiac arrest informed the mother of the events happening, as well as the plan of care. Coming from a department where we fairly regularly work codes and deal with critical patients, you have a better appreciation for what happens before, during and post critical patient care. Nurses who work on other units may not regularly deal with this type of traumatic event and sometimes the events can be entirely overwhelming. You may not know what to say to your colleagues, the doctors or other people around you, never mind what to say to the upset or sometimes grieving family members. How do you appropriately console an emotional mother who is witnessing potentially one of the worst events of her life?
At this point, I realized the true compassion and empathy of a 3East nurse, Julia. She came into the room, placed her arm on the mother's back and subsequently knelt down next to the bed to be closer. She placed her arm around her (who at the time had no other family members in the room). Julia spoke quietly to the mother, in an obvious attempt to console her, as well as calm her. The mother lifted her hand and placed it on top of Julia, closed her eyes and sat quietly listening to this special nurse (nobody else in the room could hear their discussion due to the hustle and bustle of the ongoing situation). Julia spent ample time soothing and speaking to the mother at the bedside. Thisis what nursing is all about! I later discussed this situation with the house supervisor and told her I did not even know the nurse's name. She quickly placed a phone call to 3East and learned that Julia is actually a brand new nurse who is still on orientation. This is the type of nurse and nursing care that SNHMC needs. Great job!