This is my story to nominate Maryam Pantaran for the DAISY award. She is the acting breast cancer coordinator and has made a huge change in the breast cancer patient coordination.
When she started, all the physicians were angry and fighting with the head nurse who had assigned a non-Arabic speaker to replace the Arabic speaking nurse coordinator who had gone on scholarship leave.
At that time, I felt a huge responsibility as oncology head and neck coordinator to help her in the clinic with the first time patients, follow up appointments, calling the patient to bring the slides, appointment rescheduling, psychological support, teaching, etc.
However she was challenging everybody and doing a great job. Our office now has a lot of patients coming and requesting for her to assess them, and thanking her for the great help that she gives to them. She is doing the entire job alone and she never contacted me for any help.
The physicians are also very happy with the results and patient outcomes. One of them told me that he finds in Maryam a patient coordinator, patient secretary, psychological support, physician assistant and that he would never allow her to leave us. Others said that she really surprised them, and that she was very active and helpful.
So everybody is thankful to Maryam – patients, families, physicians, and the nursing staff for the unique services she provides to the cancer patients.