At the end of August, our mother, M was admitted to LV Cedar Crest and transferred to 2K after being intubated for a still undiagnosed pulmonary illness. She was heavily sedated and ventilated, but Nurse Jenny Matuskowitz made it a point to get to know her by conversing with our family about M's outlook on life, her personality, her hobbies, her likes and dislikes. She wanted to know all about what made M, M.

When she found out that M never left the house without looking presentable, nurse Jenny took the time to sponge bathe her, clean and fix her hair as best as was possible, massage her extremities with great smelling lotion that she brought in from home especially for this purpose, and most especially, she carefully and attentively applied her makeup so that she would look like herself. How did she know what to apply? Well, M had her makeup kit with her in the hospital and Jenny carefully looked at her photo in her MYLVHN chart so that she could duplicate how M applied her makeup. I had mentioned that M was sensitive that her eyebrows had gotten sparse as she had aged and Jenny did a perfect eyebrow on her! On days when she wasn't assigned to M, she STILL took the time to come to our end of the hall to check on her and on us.

On the day it was decided that her sedation would be lightened in an attempt to extubate M, Jenny was her attending nurse and she called me at home to tell me to come to the hospital as quickly as I could, because she wanted me to be there when M became a bit more aware. She knew how important it was for there to be a familiar face present, and she made it her business to have our phone numbers to be able to get in touch with us. Because of Jenny, I got to be there to have what would ultimately become our last communication with M.

On other days, Jenny would simply stop in her room and sit on the edge of M's bed and hold her hand for a little while. To have a nurse this compassionate and caring was such blessing to us. I have never before encountered someone in a hectic, frantic hospital setting that was so calm, so attentive, so knowledgeable and detail-oriented, so kind and loving and compassionate, even amidst all the chaos of an ICU. And the fact that she had just had a baby and was doing all this in between having to schedule pumping sessions for her newborn AND caring for all her other patients, shows what a superhero Jenny is.

M missed her 80th birthday by 5 days and passed away after almost 3 weeks in the hospital, but we are so very grateful to Nurse Jenny for the endless kindness and empathy she showed our mother and showed us. Many of the nurses on the unit were just great, but Jenny stood out as the epitome of what excellence in nursing should look like. How fortunate Lehigh Valley Cedar Crest is to have such a wonderful human being on staff. Do everything in your power to keep her with you and consider having her train others in how to be a superhero for their patients!