Daisy is one of the few nurses we have who can handle pediatric patients with ease. She exudes compassion with no judgment, and she is very extraordinary in dealing with these little kids and mothers. It may seem that it's just part of our job scope as nurses but, little did she know, that she has the biggest heart for our little patients every time she sees them in the clinic. She always dealt with a catch-up vaccine because either a pedi patient is new to the state or new in the country and has no previous access to vaccines. Updating vaccine records on the spot for kids and giving them the needed ones is not easy. Sometimes she can give the maximum 7 vaccine shots just for a catch-up. She will make sure that all the necessary vaccines are given, proper vaccine and health education to the mother is met, and the next vaccine appointment is well explained. She will persuade the parent and tell you by heart the importance of pediatric vaccines and why kids must complete them. Her understanding and dedication to the kids needs is outstanding.

Aside from covering pediatric clinics, she also covers transgender and regular medical clinics. One day during a pediatric clinic schedule, they were waiting for a mother and her kids to arrive in the on-site clinic for a physical check-up and catch-up vaccine. Since they were late, the medical team decided to take walk-in patients. To their surprise, they met a homeless lady who was a total congenital deaf-mute patient. Without hesitation, Daisy patiently acknowledges the medical needs of the walk-in patient even though she is not on schedule. That was not a typical and easy visit as it took them hours to figure out everything. The patient is from out-of-state and with no available medical records to begin with. Daisy extended her patience beyond limits having a three-way sign-language conversation with the ASL video team while doing her interview intake and health assessment to the patient. She then found out that the patient had been out of seizure medications for days and that the patient was afraid that a seizure attack might happen if she was out of meds for too long. Daisy addressed that immediately and right there, medications were ordered along with laboratory blood collection on the spot to establish the health and baseline condition of the new patient. 

Daisy's patience and determination to help the patient in that situation was extraordinary. She even explained the medications and gave instructions on where to pick them after. She, and the provider both did a wonderful job in delivering the standard care the patient deserved even in the homeless population.

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During a community outreach, we signed up for a very early call time to do a flu shot at 6:30 AM. A small community church was giving free food/donations to its community, and they asked our service to do a flu outreach. That morning, there was unforeseen light rain and a sudden drop in temperature. The coordinator then told everybody to just make a line inside their car. We could have just canceled the outreach but we were already there, so we adjusted our expectations and made a new plan. I was not properly prepared for the weather, and most of the attendees were Spanish-speaking clients. When I told Daisy I was cold and was not good at adjusting to cold temperatures, without any doubt, she volunteered to approach the cars in line and do the task. She worked extra hard that morning on my behalf asking every car one-by-one for a flu shot under the light rain and the terrible cold weather. She encountered a few hesitations, but she persuaded them by sharing health education through the car window. We managed to cover most of the attendees because of Daisy's perseverance and determination to give vaccines in the community and that speaks volumes of her character.

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Daisy doesn't realize how amazing she is. She is a natural-born pediatric nurse. She talks and cares for those babies as if they were her children. She explains whatever she is doing on their level, so they can understand her. She's our mother-and-child nurse champion in the unit. We are lucky to have Nurse Daisy on our team and she deserves to be the next DAISY Honoree!