My daughter has had severe depression and since November has been to the emergency room twice and admitted once for a week to an adolescent care unit. This nurse practitioner made herself available to our family, called ahead to the hospital to let them know we were coming, worked with us through the difficult job of trying to help an adolescent when there are very few resources available to help them. Kim has consistently treated my daughter and my family with respect and has used different techniques and was able to speak to my 14-year-old so that she heard what she was saying and did not feel like she was being lectured to. She also worked closely with my daughter’s therapist to help my daughter get the most benefit from her visits and to help work to get the right combination of medicines for the issues my daughter has. I sincerely do not know what we would have done without her help.

When my daughter was at her lowest we were able to call Kim and get an immediate response. When we were admitting her to the hospital Kim made herself available to us the whole night. When we were fighting for my daughter’s life (yes, fighting for her life) it was incredibly comforting to know we had someone of Kim’s caliber on our “team”. There are so many different stories of things that she has done for my daughter and our family. She was even my son’s nurse when he was diagnosed with anxiety. I truly believe that Kim exemplifies all that this award is.