Ranessa Thomas transferred to the Transylvania Regional Hospital Medical/Surgical Unit about two years ago from one of our local nursing homes. Robert Anderson, Manager, KOALA (an Adult Day Care and Adult Day Health Program), recommended Ranessa to me as a "fabulously, caring nurse who would be an excellent staff nurse on the Med/Surg unit." Ranessa has also worked as a PRN nurse on Transitional Care Unit and at KOALA while working for us. She receives many compliments from her co-workers as being a very caring, conscientious, diligent and thorough nurse. She receives many patient compliments for her sweet, kind, caring manner. Here is a story that was reported to me by Dr. N, one of our local primary care physicians, about Ranessa's care concerning a very elderly patient who was discharged from the hospital one day.

One morning Dr. N called me and stated he wanted me to know about the kindness and over-the-top performance of one of our nursing staff, Ranessa Thomas. This patient, living at College Walk, was also one of Dr. N's patients. This patient had been discharged a few days before and had been discharged on several medications. This patient was in her late 90's and was overwhelmed with the number and complexity of her discharging medications. When Ranessa went in to do discharge instructions for this patient, the patient was very nervous and was having difficulty comprehending the number and indications for use, of each medication. And the discharge transport had arrived making the time Ranessa had with this patient more rushed and emergent. Because of the shortness of time in assessing the patient's reception and understanding of these medications, Ranessa told the patient that she would go to the assisted living community after she got off work at 7:00pm. The patient seemed relieved by this. After a busy 12 hour shift, Ranessa left the hospital and drove to Wal-Mart and purchased a pill-box for this elderly patient and then drove to the patient's residence to review all of her discharge medications, including times, doses, and frequencies. Ranessa then placed each medication in an extra large pill container with the days of week. Ranessa also documented the times of the doses in the extra large weekly pill box. This sweet elderly patient was very thankful for the time that Ranessa spent with her, and that Ranessa had gone to Wal-Mart to purchase the pillbox and that all of these actions were done after Ranessa had left the 7am to 7pm shilft on the Medical/Surgical unit at TRH. The patient subsequently called Dr. N to say that she was amazed with the great caring nature of this wonderful nurse and what a great job Ranessa had done for her. Dr. N subsequently called me to say that he was so grateful to have a nurse like that on our staff and that she was so thorough, dedicated, loving and careful in going the extra mile with this patient.

All of us on the Medical/Surgical unit are grateful and delighted to call Ranessa our peer. She is a tremendously caring nurse who demonstrates caring every day to her patients, her colleagues, physicians, and families.