My daughter was born on January 28 at Southwest. I am a first-time mom (FTM) and a cesarian delivery was not something I wanted or had an easy time coping with during my stay in the hospital. My husband and I met a lot of great nurses but Bratina really stood out as exceptional. Bratina went above and beyond by showing us tips and tricks with the baby, by repeatedly reassuring me about my healing incision, and never seeming hurried or inconvenienced by all our questions. As a FTM I had a lot of questions. She had said, "I'm here to help, put me to work". Many nurses came and went while we unsuccessfully struggled with a screaming newborn. Bratina showed us a trick to burp and calm the baby and when she was done, baby was sleeping peacefully. She gladly repeated this technique several times until we got the hang of it.
On Saturday, Jan 30 I accidentally hurt my incision which sent me into a panic attack. I could not stop shaking and crying, something that has never happened to me before. She had said her shift was over at 7 pm and when the new nurses came in to help me, Bratina was there and I seem to recall it was well after 7. I was really touched by that since other nurses came and went so often (I didn't know we'd never seen the same nurse twice over the course of our stay) and she was the only one we saw after her shift had ended. We were also VERY thankful that she managed to arrange a short nursery stay for our baby on the last night. For all of these reasons and so many more, we would like to nominate Bratina as a very deserving nurse for the DAISY Award.