As a former nurse, I am always curious how nursing practice at the bedside has changed over the years. I always held a prayer that one day if I ever become hospitalized, I would get a nurse who would care for me as I would have. I have been hospitalized multiple times (4 for childbirth, 2 for total knee replacement, and most recently for pneumonia) while the nurses whom I received care from over the years were competent enough to keep me safe, no one really stood out until Nurse Alice from Clinical Decisions Unit took care of me for two days.

Alice exemplified excellent nursing care when she displayed knowledge of my medical condition. She provided teaching, advocated for my needs and concerns, and made me feel cared for as a person and not just a patient who has a list of things to assess, check the box, and go. Alice explained the reason why I’m in this certain Unit instead of the inpatient unit. She explained my medications and the reasons why I was taking them (even though I already knew), and she checked my labs and shared abnormal values. I had to get an ultrasound and she explained what for and gave me an idea of when I would be picked up.

When my fever went up, she notified the doctors right away and relayed my anxiety over my two artificial joints and fear of infection. I saw her look at my meals and recording. Percentage intake as well as assessing my GI to make sure I am not constipated. She assessed my pain frequently and made sure I was comfortable whether it be keeping my room at a good temperature, providing ice packs to help with my pain, or helping me feel comfortable when I was febrile.

When I was starting to feel more stable on my feet, she set me up to take a shower — she provided everything I needed to make sure I was safe. While I thought she could have delegated that job to a nursing assistant — she just did it herself. She came to my room to check on me (when in the past once my nurses had safely checked the boxes of tasks required for me — I never see them again unless I ring for them).

The Clinical Decisions Unit is busy and it looked to me to have very high acuity with a lot of movement with patients coming in and out from ED, getting transferred to the floor, or just going to different diagnostic tests. Alice never made me feel that I took much of her time from other patients. In addition, and this is also one of the things that made her stand out, she appropriately shared something about herself that made me feel connected …. a shared experience outside a hospital setting. A small vignette about how many kids she has and their ages which happened to be the same ages as my kids, and small info about her nurse training made such a difference in feeling connected to someone caring for me.

Excellence in Nursing Practice involves intelligence in clinical decision-making, good communication skills, courage to be an advocate and not forgetting the art of caring in making a connection to a patient. I nominate Alice for the DAISY Award for her competence, caring, and connection. In an environment where there is staffing shortage, high patient acuity, modern technology that often more caregivers are spending their time in front of the computer screen to make sure all the boxes are done, fatigue from long work hours — it is still so important to remember.