My nephew was in a severe car/semi accident. He was transported to Thief River Falls, MN and then air lifted to Fargo, ND. The extended family was very aware that there really wasn't much hope in a recovery from this accident. His father is a person that sees the positive and he held on to the hope that he was going to pull through and recovery fully with some therapy. Nurse Kathy came on duty the morning after. She explained things very thoroughly to the family and gave us our time to process the situation. She was not rude or uncaring about her explanation, but did state this was one of the most severe brain trauma patients she had ever taken care of and the most we could expect C's life to be like, if he recovered at all. I can't imagine her having more than one patient, as my nephew was a full time job. Kathy did her best in trying to find the right medication adjustments to make him comfortable and keep his blood pressure and other vitals under control.
With the large extended family and the support from the National Guard/Marine buddies (30-40) all 3 days, she worked around all of us without denying any of us access to be in the room. I will recommend that she may need to be deprogrammed, as when his service buddies were in the room, she heard a lot of stories that shouldn't have left those doors of his ICU room. Hopefully they are safe with her.
She was so very helpful in the coordinating of LIFE SOURCE for the donation of his organs, tissue, bone marrow, etc. Kathy could have taken another assignment as scheduled the next few days, but she requested to stay in her position in the ICU and take care of my nephew. We said our goodbyes to C just a few days later. Although they couldn't use all his organs, tissue, bone marrow, etc., that we had hoped, he did help two people with the donation of his kidneys.
Note: This is Kathy's 2nd DAISY Award!