Katie Kirchner deserves to be a Daisy Award recipient because she continues to thrive as both a caregiver and a co-worker. I know she gives the best and safest care to each patient and adapts her care to meet the needs of each individual patient and or family she takes care of. She is the only nurse in the department who is bilingual.
Katie recently followed through to give a family without a car seat the information to obtain one. She has expanded her co-worker role over the years to include being an epic resource person, taking on the role of charge nurse, and has recently volunteered to take over doing staff scheduling. As a younger nurse, working with a group of seasoned nurses, she has handled the challenge of meeting resistance from some of her co-workers with grace and sweetness. She is a young mother with children at home and always comes to work without bringing outside influences to the work environment. I truly enjoy using her as a resource and role model.
Katie is always very patient/family experience focused. She adapts very easily to meet the situation as needed with each child, always putting the child at the center. She provides very detailed post-op instructions and makes sure that all the family's needs are met prior to discharge. Taking on a greater role as charge nurse, preceptor, and scheduler of staff hours, Katie has shown great professional growth in the past year. She comes forward often with suggestions for change or improvement. An example of this is in the past year bringing forward the idea to help us obtain the Spriggy kiosk at Surgicenter for a few months, this was very well received by families. Katie is always a very positive nurse with a confident and calming manner at the bedside.