Rina Levine
November 2021
Rina
Levine
,
BSN, RN, CCRN
Intensive Care Unit
St Lucie Medical Center
Port St Lucie
,
FL
United States
Rina made her feel like a person again.
Rina Levine always goes above and beyond and takes great pride in being a hands-on nurse. She started as a PCT in 2007, then became an ICU RN. Throughout her whole SLMC career, she has always treated her patients like family. During the pandemic, she spent lockdown time with her daughter watching videos on hair braiding techniques. She shared what she learned and brought smiles to several ICU nurses by braiding their hair on breaks. She gave them very special and fancy French braids to wear under our PPE. It was a brief moment of decompression and relaxation before going into work, during an incredibly difficult time for nursing.
Rina got very good at hair braiding and began to braid the hair of our ICU patients, as well. Many of our patients were on life support for days, and their hair had become messy - even with shampoo caps and combing. One of our female patients got better and thankfully came off the ventilator. She woke up to find her hair had been French braided! The patient and her daughter were so very moved that Rina had spent the time to braid her hair. The patient kept touching and stroking her hair and said Rina made her feel like a person again. The daughter said she was so grateful her mom was getting better, and really could not believe someone had taken the time to braid her mom’s hair. I told her Rina always treats her patients like family, and the daughter said she and her mom have been in other hospitals and never felt so cared for as they did in our hospital. I told Rina how she made her patient and daughter feel, and Rina said braiding hair was something that she had learned to share with her daughter, when she can make her patients look better, it makes her feel happy to be a nurse.
Rina got very good at hair braiding and began to braid the hair of our ICU patients, as well. Many of our patients were on life support for days, and their hair had become messy - even with shampoo caps and combing. One of our female patients got better and thankfully came off the ventilator. She woke up to find her hair had been French braided! The patient and her daughter were so very moved that Rina had spent the time to braid her hair. The patient kept touching and stroking her hair and said Rina made her feel like a person again. The daughter said she was so grateful her mom was getting better, and really could not believe someone had taken the time to braid her mom’s hair. I told her Rina always treats her patients like family, and the daughter said she and her mom have been in other hospitals and never felt so cared for as they did in our hospital. I told Rina how she made her patient and daughter feel, and Rina said braiding hair was something that she had learned to share with her daughter, when she can make her patients look better, it makes her feel happy to be a nurse.