Melissa Bowen
September 2022
Melissa
Bowen
,
BSN, RN, CCRN
Patient Care Coordinators
ECU Health Medical Center
Greenville
,
NC
United States
There were moments of silence, tears of joy, and tears of sadness. Yet, these nurse leaders stood with these parents.
Recently, I was in awe of the teamwork and nursing leadership that was displayed by these two nurses, Melissa Bowen, RN, and Travis Blowe, RN, Patient Care Coordinators. These two nurse leaders received a call from the Charge Nurse from the Children’s ED that they needed their support in helping to communicate the news to parents that no nurse ever wants to deliver. There were four children under the age of 18 involved in a terrible automobile accident, two had survived and two had not. When the children arrived on the scene they were identified as “Jane Does’” due to the severity of their injuries. However, the two surviving children were severely injured and were also unable to be properly identified.
These two nurse leaders wanted to ensure that they were providing accurate information and certainly not offering false hope of survival to the parents. To ensure that they were leading with empathy and grace, they made calls to the inpatient unit to get a clear description of the children, additionally, they even took the time to reach out to the state trooper that led the investigation of the accident on the scene to ensure that they had as much descriptive detail as possible when meeting with the parents.
After collecting all of the appropriate descriptions and information about the children, Melissa and Travis met with the parents, listened to their descriptions of their children, then called the units to validate and verify accuracy as much as possible. Once confirmed, these two nurse leaders escorted the parents to the units and stayed with them, including moments of silence as they learned that one had survived and the other had not. They knew that this news would bring mixed emotions to this family. There were moments of silence, tears of joy, and tears of sadness. Yet, these nurse leaders stood with these parents.
I am in awe of the Compassion and Empathy that they both showed. I am reminded of the quote by Maya Angelou, “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” I am so proud to call each of them an ECU Health Nurse!
These two nurse leaders wanted to ensure that they were providing accurate information and certainly not offering false hope of survival to the parents. To ensure that they were leading with empathy and grace, they made calls to the inpatient unit to get a clear description of the children, additionally, they even took the time to reach out to the state trooper that led the investigation of the accident on the scene to ensure that they had as much descriptive detail as possible when meeting with the parents.
After collecting all of the appropriate descriptions and information about the children, Melissa and Travis met with the parents, listened to their descriptions of their children, then called the units to validate and verify accuracy as much as possible. Once confirmed, these two nurse leaders escorted the parents to the units and stayed with them, including moments of silence as they learned that one had survived and the other had not. They knew that this news would bring mixed emotions to this family. There were moments of silence, tears of joy, and tears of sadness. Yet, these nurse leaders stood with these parents.
I am in awe of the Compassion and Empathy that they both showed. I am reminded of the quote by Maya Angelou, “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” I am so proud to call each of them an ECU Health Nurse!