Have you ever had this experience? Looking for something, unable to find it, and then feeling exasperated, telling your mother or another figure who shepherds you through life, to which they calmly reply, "It's right there." You retort, "No, it's not," Then they calmly point out where to look again, and then you find it? That reminds me of Barbara Dahl. That is how she guides me so often to what is right in front of me, but I didn't have the clarity, pause, or tools to find it myself.
It is hard to describe how special Barbara is and how we feel about her. What follows is in bullet points, perhaps how Barbara would organize a learning module in "bite-size" pieces, as she would say, so the layout is easier for the learner to process.

I wish I could go back 40 years ago to watch her when she was a new nurse here at Saddleback. She was a new graduate RN on the ortho unit, called 3B back then. Barbara's demeanor is calming and reassuring. It is easy to imagine her being attentive to her patients and their families because that is how she treats us. She is articulate and patient with those she cares for now, other nurses. She is never condescending but always listens and then assists in an unhurried, methodical fashion. Barbara has been an educator in our hospital for a long time, and we, as educators, have learned a lot about how to conduct ourselves from her. And whenever needed, she made herself available to us.

Barbara has been a role model for conducting meetings efficiently and keeping content relevant for nurses and nursing practice. She leads the Policy Steering Committee with a global sense of which stakeholders to include on the various topics and which nursing and multidisciplinary areas may be impacted. Although she prefaces many statements with, "I'm no longer at the bedside," she still thinks like a nurse and has not lost that perspective. She advocates for bringing content to those at the bedside for their viewpoint and to verify our processes are accurate to the workflow.

Even when working on something she is not actively involved in, we seek her opinion, and she gives valuable feedback and insight. And when working on projects together, like years ago, the care plan initiative that was all hands-on deck, Barbara helped identify the "plan of care" as a tool in Epic, designed staff re-education, guided the bedside nurses on the project, assisted with training, went up to floors and did one-to-ones with the nurses.

Barbara did fantastic work creating our "For Clinicians" resource page, a streamlined one-stop access point for references and clinical guidance on just about every topic a bedside nurse might need to access. She made it easy to use with a professional and modern appearance.

She was hands-on again in leading our training about hazardous drugs at the system level, teaching nurses in simulations, and creating an online repository of valuable tools and resources.

Barbara always refers to yearly training as "AME Days," a throwback to when all the education was live on certain days. (Even though it has been years and years and years since it was AME Days) With the departure from in-person skills, Barbara became the guru for YouLearn and online learning platforms for our nurses.
Barbara was a mentor when she identified me as a subject matter expert for specific policies and helped me navigate at the system level. This engaged me in the process as I partnered with others in our organization.

To summarize, I think of Whitney Houston singing "I'm Every Woman" because Barbara is our go-to; she can do everything well with attention to detail. She is an educator who still has the eyes of a nurse, who has humility and won't like the attention of receiving this award. But she should receive this award because she is so deserving, and she doesn't realize how much we all rely on her or how much she has impacted the knowledge of Saddleback nurses and the care provided at the bedside.

It is hard to put into words how special Barbara is and how to describe the chasm she will leave when she starts her next chapter in retirement. Barbara is a nurse's nurse. We are grateful she was ours to learn from and work alongside all these years. 

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It is an honor to recognize and celebrate a nurse who has devoted her career to the compassionate care of others, first, in 1979, as a medical-surgical orthopedic Saddleback new graduate nurse and clinical nurse and then for the care of the staff as a unit clinical educator and then a house-wide educator. The DAISY Lifetime Achievement Award is a capstone recognition for a great nurse’s career.

Barbara is a consummate professional who has proudly mentored other nurses during her years at the bedside and the “staff side.” The simple ways she lived our Saddleback Medical Center values impacted the educator dimension of a nurse. In every role and project Barbara worked on, she did so with impeccable integrity, ownership, best practice, and compassion. Her contributions to nursing practice throughout nursing services have been outstanding. Over the years, Barbara led the American Heart Training Program, New Hire Orientation, General Nursing Orientation, New Graduate Nursing Orientation, Patient Care Technician Orientation, Annual Mandatory Education, and Preceptor Training. She chaired the Education Council and the Policy and Procedure Committee, conducted nursing educational needs assessments, developed countless informative intranet pages and YouLearn modules, and taught electronic health record courses and numerous applications such as Site Publisher, Domino, Captivate, and YouLearn. She uses best practices when leading any change project and has led many. Barbara has been a member of many shared governance councils that valued her input and insight. Over the years, she was briefly a department of one! With new educators brought into Professional Development, Barbara has helped them to feel comfortable, knowledgeable, and capable. 

As Barbara retires after 43 years of service, she leaves a legacy, and our appreciation for her contributions will last for a long time.