I don’t know anyone who works in some part of the medical profession who doesn’t have an idea as to what is meant, when they hear that word that is seemingly so overused it risks losing the gravity it should carry when uttered in any sentence and in any context: Compassion.  It isn’t a complicated concept.  Many of life’s most important aspects aren’t as complex and nuanced as life might have you believe. But fewer people know the etymology of the word compassion or its origins. Compassion comes from the Latin word “compati,” which literally means “to suffer with.” It is more than mere empathy and providing extraordinary medical care—it is the deep desire to help someone who is suffering, and to be able to assist that person, in easing their pain.  And while compassion and extraordinary medical care and knowledge, perhaps even professional stewardship and mentoring are often the grand motivators that often lead to a nurse being nominated for The Daisy Award, Gabriella Dull’s nomination, this nomination, stems from a different motive altogether:  Her indomitable resilience.  That isn’t to suggest that Gabriella is not a compassionate practitioner of medical care. She most certainly is and clearly has a talent for being a skilled and empathetic healer. But it is her incredible resilience in her attitude and her unwavering dedication to be compassionate in the face of impossible circumstances, my bad attitude at times, that sets her apart from her peers.
As a former combat medic in the US Army we were taught, drilled, and trained to be resilient as a means of being able to endure the hardships of the profession, the nature of the work, the austere environments, and often times deadly circumstances. “Be a tennis ball, not a crystal ball,” my leadership would tell us. The harder this war, and life throws you to the ground, the harder you must be able and willing to bounce right back up. It is a rare quality that is all too often overlooked and underappreciated. Much like any nurse working at Banner University Medical Center, or most any nurse working in the field in today’s current climate of political correctness and over sensitivity.  My specific situation involving Gabriella Dull was one such occasion, where she demonstrated all the qualities that any patient would be grateful to experience and witness firsthand. Compassion? Of course, but also, tenacity, patience, grace, and unwavering resilience. Why am I here?  I have complicated necrotizing pancreatitis. This started for me some twelve weeks ago, and to say that it has been the most painful experience of my short thirty-eight years would truly be the under statement of the century. I would present to the Emergency Room in Sierra Vista, Arizona in the midafternoon with the most severe abdominal pain I had ever felt.  Mind you, when I was on active duty in the US Army, I suffered an umbilical hernia during a field training exercise that would require immediate emergency surgery that would involve a five-centimeter bowel resection of completely infarcted tissue, the hernia repair laparoscopic surgery itself, a mesh screen placement, to include a full week of hospitalization immediate dialysis that would miraculously save not only my kidneys, but also my life.  
So, what does any of this have to do with Gabriella Dull, and her resilience? We’re getting to and three months of recovery. However, this abdominal pain, brought on by my pancreatitis, made that hernia feel like a mere tummy ache by comparison. It was only later that I would learn I was suffering from diabetic ketoacidosis, hyponatremia, severe acute pancreatitis, an elevated blood sugar level above six hundred and fifty, and a triglyceride level above thirteen thousand three hundred. The pancreatitis alone was so severe it nearly killed me, but to top it all off, I had gone into renal failure and my kidneys had basically thrown their hands up and declared, “that’s it, this is way too much for me, I quit.” I would then undergo that.  Because all of this, for me, began twelve weeks ago, and since this all started, it has been marred by one complication after another.
First, I would develop an infection in my pancreas while recovering in the ICU that would see me on an aggressive intravenous antibiotic therapy lasting four long and painful weeks. While on IV antibiotics for those four weeks I would develop a pancreatic pseudocyst.  According to some of the specialists I would speak to, these pancreatic pseudocysts are typically in the three-to-six-centimeter department in regard to size and don’t always require intervention or treatment.

Mine on the other hand, was seventeen by twenty-five centimeters, and was not subtle about constantly reminding me it was going to be the author of all of my mental and physical pain for the next eight weeks.  It was far too big to simply be monitored and left untreated.  After several referrals to a vast array of specialists I would find myself at Banner University Medical Center’s Interventional Gastroenterology Department.  It was here that I would undergo an endoscopic ultrasound cystogastrostomy to place a lumen apposing metal stent, or LAMS as my doctor called it, between my pancreas and my stomach to allow it to drain.  An outpatient procedure that would see me sent home only to return to the very same Emergency Department in Sierra Vista, where this all began on account of a fever that was not responding to Tylenol and instead was rising from 101.3 degrees to 103.4 degrees. Clearly there was something wrong. 
The ER doc had no choice but to send me back to where I had my endoscopic procedure to begin with, so back to Banner. I went via ambulance transport.  A slew of blood testing, cultures, other labs and tests, and a second endoscopic procedure would lead to the discovery of not one, but three infections. One fungal, and two bacterial. One of which was Vancomycin Resistant Enterococci or VRE as its more commonly referred to. I would also begin losing large amounts of blood from internal bleeding and in two days’ time my hemoglobin would drop from 14 to 6.9 that would require me to have blood transfused and once again, a new course of aggressive intravenous antibiotics was on the docket.  This time, instead of four weeks, my team of infectious disease doctors informed me it was going to be a minimum of six weeks of IV antibiotic therapy to address and treat all three infections simultaneously, possibly longer, but six weeks guaranteed.

So where does registered nurse Gabriella Dull come into this story? In early July, the beginning of the end, is where I began to truly lose sight of things. Depression and hopelessness would grip my soul as this would be the second time, I was being hospitalized in less than two months, and it felt like I just couldn’t catch a break. One complication after another with little progress being made, three more endoscopic necrosectomy procedures, three trips to Interventional Radiology to have a drain placed, removed and repositioned, then removed again, I had given up and all there seemed to be left for me to do was despair.  All my training about being the tennis ball, not a crystal ball had gone right out of the window.  I was feeling as though God just didn’t want me for one of His sun beams anymore and I was destined to just keep catching one “L” after another, without a “W” in sight. That is, until I met and was cared for by a nurse who would remind me that there are some things in life you just never give up on. In her case, it was me.  Enter registered nurse Gabriella Dull. The first thing I noticed about her, was her smile and her infectious personality, no pun intended.

Her energy was so radiant that despite being required to wear a mask and gown when entering my room on account of my VRE, the room was lit up with her hope, joy, peace of mind, and for the first time in over a month my spirits, right along with it. Cumulatively I have been in the hospital now for seventy-five days in the past twelve weeks.  I was starting to give up hope of ever being discharged. But it became readily apparent to me that no matter how negative my attitude might become, or how dark my depression might sink, Gabriella was still going to gently knock and wait to be told to come in, enter my room and light it up like the Christmas Tree lighting ceremony at Rockefeller Center in New York City. It wasn’t just her smile, her punctuality with my pain management medications, or as stated previously, her willingness to suffer my pain with me and show me true compassion, but her unwavering resilience and determination to wear a smile and to radiate a positive demeanor and energy, regardless of how rude I might have been because I miscalculated when my next dose of medications were to come around. Being short with her because I haven’t slept in almost three days due to my abdominal discomfort. Venting to her about my “travel restrictions” when it comes to not being able to leave the unit because I have VRE, as though its somehow her fault. It isn’t. We both know that.

In spite of all of my misplaced frustrations, stress, anger, and constant pain Gabriella never once showed me anything other than true compassion, patience, kindness, and peace.  A genuine demonstration of absolute resilience, each and every time she walked in, to do what she does best: Light up the room and provide me with the best and most professional care any patient could ever hope to receive. She makes me feel seen, and listened to, not just heard. She actively listens to my concerns, not just waits for her turn to talk. She advocates for me with the on-call doctors, even when she doesn’t have the time, she manages to find it anyhow.  Being the recipient of this level of positive professionalism, and her dedication to providing the best medical care she is capable of, no matter how down in the dumps I might be feeling, or unintentionally rude I may be speaking to her and others, it really felt like her compassionate care reached down and dragged me out of this dark hole my necrotizing pancreatitis, and an endless stream of complications, had kicked me into.  It is clear, Registered Nurse Gabriella Dull is exactly where she is meant to be, doing exactly what she is meant to be doing.

I implore you, to consider her for The Daisy Award, and to consider this nomination, even if she doesn’t win.  She is a true force for good, and I cannot thank her and her fellow staff enough, for helping me to find hope and to dare to be optimistic once more. There was a light at the end of this long, dark tunnel. I just never expected it to be the high level of extraordinary and professional medical care I have been given, and more specifically, the bright smile and unwavering positive attitude that came along with it.