Rosalie Suarez
December 2022
Rosalie
Suarez
,
RN
GI Clinic
SickKids Hospital
Toronto
,
Ontario
Canada
She found ways to alleviate some of the in-person workloads of the sick nurses, relieving the one unaffected nurse to look after the booked EEN patient in person, while the others manage the day-to-day clinic nursing tasks in a virtual setting.
The Inflammatory Bowel Diseases (IBD) team would like to nominate Rosalie Suarez for the DAISY Award. She is deserving of the DAISY Award for her relentless advocacy for patients, starting with her leadership role in our weekly Mental Health Multidisciplinary Rounds where she helps identify patients in need of mental health support and discusses the challenges with the IBD team, alongside our health psychologist and psychiatrist. Seeing the gaps in our team's ability to communicate with these patients, Rosalie spearheaded a series of motivational interviewing (MI) workshops with an in-house MI expert, which has helped equip us in our daily therapeutic communication skills with patients and families who can be oftentimes crippled with anxiety and distress.
The most recent example we'd like to illustrate is a representation of nursing resiliency with the intent for family advocacy, amidst a pandemic when of late, an increasing number of nurses are contracting the COVID-19 virus. In this particular scenario, four of our program’s 5 nurses were symptomatic of COVID-19. While our IBD program could be on the verge of a nursing shutdown, Rosalie in her own time (a weekend!) ensured that one of our patients would still receive proper care the following Monday. This particular patient was booked for Enteral Nutrition Therapy (EEN) in the Short Stay Unit. Weeks prior to the event, the family had a difficult time deciding on therapy, and when they finally decided that EEN was the best option for their child, they agreed to a 2-day booking in our Short Stay Unit. EEN therapy requires the expertise of both a dietitian and a nurse. In this case, where most of our nurses were sick, the patient’s appointment would have been canceled due to a lack of nursing resources. Rosalie, on her Sunday, called the family to explain the situation and received the message loud and clear that this patient was desperate for treatment, and that cancellation was not an option. Rosalie proceeded to contact a couple of key nursing leaders who at this point had their own nursing resource limitations to manage. Rosalie relayed the dilemma to our own IBD nursing team. She found ways to alleviate some of the in-person workloads of the sick nurses, relieving the one unaffected nurse to look after the booked EEN patient in person, while the others manage the day-to-day clinic nursing tasks in a virtual setting.
In the days that follow, Rosalie devoted time and effort to come up with contingency plans should a similar scenario happen again in the future, to ensure that patients' treatment go as planned. This particular incident not only helped the IBD program re-examine our EEN program resourcing, but it also ensured that our very sick patient received their treatment in a timely manner. This helped avoid increasing acuity of illness, alleviated the family's anxiety, and allowed the family to move forward with subsequent care decisions for their child.
Rosalie’s compassion and empathy for families and patients are consistently exemplified by her commitment to making them feel valued. Forefront in her mind is provision of excellent family-centered care. Where this year’s SickKids Hospital's nurses' week hashtag is #OurKindOfNursingIs…”, the whole IBD team would like to fill the blank as “OUR KIND OF NURSING IS ROSALIE – resilient, advocate, compassionate, and champion”.
The most recent example we'd like to illustrate is a representation of nursing resiliency with the intent for family advocacy, amidst a pandemic when of late, an increasing number of nurses are contracting the COVID-19 virus. In this particular scenario, four of our program’s 5 nurses were symptomatic of COVID-19. While our IBD program could be on the verge of a nursing shutdown, Rosalie in her own time (a weekend!) ensured that one of our patients would still receive proper care the following Monday. This particular patient was booked for Enteral Nutrition Therapy (EEN) in the Short Stay Unit. Weeks prior to the event, the family had a difficult time deciding on therapy, and when they finally decided that EEN was the best option for their child, they agreed to a 2-day booking in our Short Stay Unit. EEN therapy requires the expertise of both a dietitian and a nurse. In this case, where most of our nurses were sick, the patient’s appointment would have been canceled due to a lack of nursing resources. Rosalie, on her Sunday, called the family to explain the situation and received the message loud and clear that this patient was desperate for treatment, and that cancellation was not an option. Rosalie proceeded to contact a couple of key nursing leaders who at this point had their own nursing resource limitations to manage. Rosalie relayed the dilemma to our own IBD nursing team. She found ways to alleviate some of the in-person workloads of the sick nurses, relieving the one unaffected nurse to look after the booked EEN patient in person, while the others manage the day-to-day clinic nursing tasks in a virtual setting.
In the days that follow, Rosalie devoted time and effort to come up with contingency plans should a similar scenario happen again in the future, to ensure that patients' treatment go as planned. This particular incident not only helped the IBD program re-examine our EEN program resourcing, but it also ensured that our very sick patient received their treatment in a timely manner. This helped avoid increasing acuity of illness, alleviated the family's anxiety, and allowed the family to move forward with subsequent care decisions for their child.
Rosalie’s compassion and empathy for families and patients are consistently exemplified by her commitment to making them feel valued. Forefront in her mind is provision of excellent family-centered care. Where this year’s SickKids Hospital's nurses' week hashtag is #OurKindOfNursingIs…”, the whole IBD team would like to fill the blank as “OUR KIND OF NURSING IS ROSALIE – resilient, advocate, compassionate, and champion”.