May 2021
Lori
Timmons
,
RN
Riverside Dialysis Center Ambulatory Care Services
Harris Health System
Lori came to the need of her team
Lori Timmons is a “go above and beyond" director on the average workday. Lori can be found at Riverside at 7 am, 4 pm, and 12 am on any given day. She is at Riverside role modeling exemplary professional nursing practice, promoting the image and vision of Nursing within the Harris Health System, and serving as a one-on-one mentor with staff; specifically to RNs on her team with less than one year of dialysis experience.
Exceptional is what Lori is. This nomination, however, comes from an act that I have never witnessed from some of the most exceptional leaders I have known.
During the 2021 Winter Storm Uri, Lori Responded to the call. Lori came to the need of her team and the need of the Harris Health community, employees, and patients alike. There were 100+ patients in the hospital setting in need of dialysis treatment. Nearly every dialysis center in the state of Texas was unable to open its doors and gain operations. Family members and loved ones were forced to travel to the emergency centers, hoping to gain access to the life-saving measure of dialysis treatment. With the impossible ratios of patients needing dialysis to nurses available to provide care for those patients, hospital systems found themselves in dire constraints.
Calls began to nurses around the nation. Nurses were called and asked to come to provide dialysis care for patients. At 10 pm, on the night of the storm, Lori answered the call. Lori drove through ice and other road conditions that every person in the state of Texas cautioned or even feared to drive on. She drove during these conditions, not to direct operations, but to serve! She reported to LBJ to provide direct care to 60 plus patients who needed urgent and emergent dialysis to possibly sustain life.
Yes, in the middle of the night, the director of our ACS clinic went to serve on the frontline. She hasn't provided direct care with accessing a dialysis lifeline for a patient in over 12 years but the skill to provide care proved to be second nature. Lori rose to the challenge. She provided dialysis treatment to our community and patients in need. And she performed these heroic acts without saying a word. The staff didn't even know Lori left her home until we all returned to the clinic setting days later.
Exceptional is what Lori is. This nomination, however, comes from an act that I have never witnessed from some of the most exceptional leaders I have known.
During the 2021 Winter Storm Uri, Lori Responded to the call. Lori came to the need of her team and the need of the Harris Health community, employees, and patients alike. There were 100+ patients in the hospital setting in need of dialysis treatment. Nearly every dialysis center in the state of Texas was unable to open its doors and gain operations. Family members and loved ones were forced to travel to the emergency centers, hoping to gain access to the life-saving measure of dialysis treatment. With the impossible ratios of patients needing dialysis to nurses available to provide care for those patients, hospital systems found themselves in dire constraints.
Calls began to nurses around the nation. Nurses were called and asked to come to provide dialysis care for patients. At 10 pm, on the night of the storm, Lori answered the call. Lori drove through ice and other road conditions that every person in the state of Texas cautioned or even feared to drive on. She drove during these conditions, not to direct operations, but to serve! She reported to LBJ to provide direct care to 60 plus patients who needed urgent and emergent dialysis to possibly sustain life.
Yes, in the middle of the night, the director of our ACS clinic went to serve on the frontline. She hasn't provided direct care with accessing a dialysis lifeline for a patient in over 12 years but the skill to provide care proved to be second nature. Lori rose to the challenge. She provided dialysis treatment to our community and patients in need. And she performed these heroic acts without saying a word. The staff didn't even know Lori left her home until we all returned to the clinic setting days later.