Wendy Holler is an advanced practice nurse, Clinical Nurse Specialist, with 34 years of experience —12 years at the bedside, 10 a clinical educator/staff development specialist, and 13 + years in the CNS role. She earned her BSN from Widener University in 1988, and her MSN from the University of Delaware in 2009. She holds three certifications —rehabilitation, orthopaedic, and adult CNS. She joined the Association of Rehabilitation Nurses (ARN) in 1995, and is a leader who co‐authored the Professional Practice Model for Rehabilitation, served as elected Director (2017‐2020), and is recognized as a Fellow of the Association (FARN). She is also a member of the American Nurses Association, the National Association of Orthopaedic Nurses, the American Holistic Nurses Association, and the National Association of Clinical Nurse Specialists. She started her career at Jefferson in Philadelphia, worked 15 years for Christiana Care in Delaware, and currently enjoys her role as a member of the Nursing Professional Development team here at Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health ‐‐each Magnet recognized.

She received DAISY recognition early in her LGH career for her role in settling differences between sisters, and supporting this family through anticipatory grievance as their mother ethically transitioned to comfort care. She believes there is always an opportunity for improvement, whether it is to make patient care safer, the patient‐family experience better, and nurse work more satisfying overall.

This nurse works across the three spheres of CNS influence—patient, nursing, and system using evidence‐based practice (EBP) to get results. She has published on patient safety, establishing a culture of gait belts, professional development for nurses in EBP and research, and a professional practice model for rehabilitation nursing. In addition to nursing leadership, Wendy was elected twice to serve consecutive 4‐year terms for Cecil County Public Schools in Maryland; she served as the Vice President for six of those years. Wendy is an advocate and is formerly trained for this role having received ARN’s scholarship to the Nurses in Washington Internship (NIWI). She is passionate about nursing and continued funding of Title VIII: Nursing Workforce Development Programs growing competent nurses to keep America well and cared for. Wendy introduced a letter to Congressman Smucker voicing the burden of taxing nurse tuition reimbursement dollars. She is heading back to Capitol Hill next month to address the FDA ruling on aromatherapy as a pharmaceutical that is preventing nurses from researching its use. Wendy has a small consulting LLC. She is a proud mother of two artistic daughters and is happy to mentor anyone for professional growth and development.

During Covid‐19 high census, this nominee stepped out of her Nursing Professional development comfort level to join her 4Lime colleagues in direct patient care. She filled staffing needs on Friday evenings several times. While caring for patients, she found renewed energy and has been working on a plan to help other nurses renew, revitalize, and remember the real reason they chose nursing. She shared her first inspirations in our InTouch with Nursing Newsletter, authoring: Roos, Relationship Based Care (RBC) & Reiki. In this, she reminds her nurse colleagues how our nursing model of care, RBC, described by the American Nurses Association‐‐is knowledge‐based care, the core or essence of nursing practice expressed through the therapeutic relationship between the nurse and patient/family. It is built on the art and science of nursing practice and is conveyed through relationships and privileged intimacy. Since publishing her story, she stepped out of her wheelhouse once more to build a business plan to deliver a holistic care environment for LGH nurses. In addition, she is actively helping nurses mitigate burn‐out and heal from Covid‐19. In May she will present her story and a path to healing through self‐care at BETTER TOGETHER: Promoting Wellness in Nurses, a Lancaster General Health created and sponsored regional conference. Also in May she will co‐lead and mentor her 4Lime RN colleague in presenting, Nurse Wellness: Leading Spiritual Self Care through Storytelling at the National Association of Orthopaedic Nurses 42nd Annual Congress. Their podium presentation shares the 4 Lime Covid‐19 story, how their elective surgeries were shut down and they became Covid Care nurses overnight. They align story‐telling to nursing theory and will then invite other nurses traumatized by Covid experiences to share their stories to heal.

This nurse is drawn to staff needs and works with them to make any day a better day‐‐whether it is doing a medication pass for them, helping to plan care for a behaviorally challenging patient, talking them through how to access our LGH holistic practice team for massage and acupuncture, sharing a deep breath, or encouraging them to take walk outside. This candidate believes that nurses share love and hopes to spread this message every opportunity she gets.

Over the last three years, this candidate has taken time away from work to better herself. She studies and practices reiki. Taking time to establish these new skills, she now shares reiki with confidence. Recently, she received a Legacy Moment recognition ‐‐Thank you for sharing your Reiki skill with our patient in room X. You are just what she needed‐ and your therapeutic communication and ability to draw out and address her concerns is another healing modality. Thank you again.

She believes that holistic care modalities are one way we can close gaps in health disparity, providing free and low‐cost healing through reiki and aromatherapy. She sees everyone as valued ‐‐this is evidenced in a 4 Lime falls reduction project addressing the unique challenges of our patients who share mental illness and developmental differences as a part of their problems.

Aside from the Full Moon Project on 4Lime, this nurse has facilitated and shared many LGH success stories at National Conferences. Last year, she mentored a 4 North RN in preparing a poster and delivering its audio presentation for the NAON 41st Orthopaedic Congress, improving care for geriatric fracture patients.

This year, she and two 4 Lime RNs will deliver three presentations, two podiums, and a poster at the 42nd Congress. The presentations highlight the development of a new role, the Throughput Nurse, Theory Grounded Nurse Self‐Care competency, and lastly, the poster, introducing a simple tool that reduced hospital-acquired pressure injuries significantly. And while there is no clear evidence that gait belts prevent falls, everyone at LGH has learned the value of gait belt use to mitigate harm should a fall occur ‐‐this nurse introduced the concept of a culture of gait belt safety here at LGH, worked closely with Nursing Management and all staff to set gait belts at the point of care, ready for staff access to support patient safety. This nurse published Gait Belts 101 and our LGH story in the peer‐reviewed journal, American Nurse Today.

This nominee served Lancaster County as a volunteer at the Lancaster Reiki clinic. As a level II Reiki practitioner, she supported a level I class taught in Lancaster City. During this class, she met D. D, an open spirit, unemployed, living in a recovery home and working on his own self‐care escaping addiction. D was learning reiki to build his resilience. That day, in class, this nurse nominee suggested he join our LGH team. Today, D supports 4N as a PCT. He loves his work and his co‐workers love him. She is mentoring him back to school at PA College where he will study nursing. He hopes to become a behavioral health nurse caring for others whose shoes he has walked in. D loves to share his story and our nurse candidate has him preparing for Story Slam 2023!

NOTE: This is Wendy's 2nd DAISY Award!