Dawn Boughton is wonderful team member. She always has a positive attitude at work. I know it is going to be a good day when she is here. She makes an instant connection with each of her patients by finding out what they are interested in or a commonality to develop a rapport.
She also has been the Chairperson for the Patient Safety committee in our area for the last 2 years. She is very conscientious about making sure that Patient Safety is included in all aspects of our care. She is diligent to communicate the latest safety priorities, contribute to the data collection tools, and offer her suggestions for ways to improve processes.
Dawn is constantly thinking outside of the box; asking questions about why we do things the way we do; and offering different solutions that might work. She is not ok with the answer "that's just the way we have always done it". She always goes the extra mile for all her patients making sure they understand what they are going to experience by identifying a commonality she may have with the family or the child. You can always tell this puts them at ease as they seem to appear less anxious after she has prepped them for the procedure. She is happy to take the challenging patients to try and 'break through'.
One of our teenagers, a transplant patient, whom she has taken care of several times was particularly difficult in his wake-up after anesthesia and getting his echo done (which every child has to do after the cath). She was able to figure out if we did the echo before the procedure, he was much more compliant and amenable.
Dawn Boughton is a definite role model to me as well as all our staff here in the Cath Lab!