On behalf of my family, I am excited and honored to nominate Mr. Rhett Beddow (RN in the first­ floor Trauma Unit at Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center) for The DAISY Award!

To provide you with some background, my stepfather (whom I will refer to as "Pap" moving forward) had emergency surgery on Thanksgiving Day to remove his ruptured gallbladder. Pap was 98-years-old, almost blind (macular degeneration), almost deaf (limited hearing out of his right ear only), and lived alone (with assistance from his four daughters). Following his surgery, Pap refused to go through physical therapy after having just one PT session, and also opted for DNI and DNR. When he mentioned his wish for DNR to his palliative care doctor, the doctor reminded him that he had a pacemaker and asked Pap if he wanted it to be deactivated (which Pap said he did ... that he just wanted to go to heaven).

Pap's pacemaker was deactivated on Monday and the doctors didn't know if he would live minutes, hours, or weeks following the deactivation. As you can imagine, our family held vigil at the hospital for days, awaiting Pap's demise.

During this time, Rhett Beddow entered our lives! My sister, two stepsisters, and Pap's grandchildren all got to know Rhett and we all absolutely adored him! He took the time to talk to all of us and was such a joy to us during an extremely tumultuous time. As you can imagine, we took turns visiting Pap. As soon as one of us sisters would tell the others that Pap's nurse that day was Rhett, we would all take a sigh of relief and were assured that our Pap was in good hands!

I can still recall the first time I met Rhett.  he told me that his primary focus was to make sure that my Pap was comfortable and pain-free. I cannot tell you what a relief it was to hear that. Nothing against the other nurses (who told us it was counterintuitive for them to take care of my stepfather because they are accustomed to keeping people alive instead of helping them die), but Rhett never concerned himself with that way of thinking. It is my understanding that these nurses assigned to patients such as my stepfather, are not "hospice trained", but that did not stop Rhett. He took it upon himself to contact the hospice representative(s) directly to ask questions and follow up on our behalf as needed. He was compassionate, caring, kind, thoughtful, and ALWAYS made my Pap's comfort and pain management his top priority. Rhett took the time to learn each of our names, our relationship to Pap and was always concerned about our wellbeing (asking if the family needed anything once Pap's needs were met). Rhett took the time to explain what medications he was administering and when he noticed I was writing notes down, he made sure I had the correct spelling of all the medications and that I understood what the medications were for (so that I could convey this information to my siblings to keep everyone informed).

Rhett became my Pap's voice and advocate (especially when Pap became incoherent). Things changed from day-to-day (more so from hour-to-hour) and so many issues arose with Pap's medications and his eligibility to remain in the hospital versus the need to be moved to a hospice facility. Rhett did his best to "sort through the weeds" for us and would immediately make phone calls until he received clarification, or the firm answer he needed to move forward.
 
Eventually, the decision was made that we would have to move Pap to a hospice facility, which meant that Pap's medications had to be switched from being administered via an IV to sublingual. This was not a smooth transition (but Rhett tried his darndest throughout the day). We learned later that evening that Pap would not be able to move to hospice because of the need to switch him back to administering his medications via an IV because the sublingual administration was unsuccessful. Once again, it was Rhett who came to the rescue by administering the medications via IV (and having the intuition and common sense not to remove Pap's IV tube in the first place).

Pap passed away on Wednesday, which was supposed to be Rhett's day off. As fate would have it (or as I prefer to think of it as a "God wink"), Rhett switched schedules with a co-worker and was on duty that day. Once Pap passed away, Rhett greeted me and every other family member with a hug upon arrival and offered his sympathies to our family. He also brought us a Comfort Box and told us to take as much time as we needed to be with our Pap. Rhett told us that he felt like part of our family, and we certainly felt the same way about Rhett.

As far as I am concerned, Rhett demonstrated ALL of the following criteria (as explained in my narrative above) and is so well-deserving to be the recipient of the DAISY Award ... he most definitely checked off all of the boxes below ...

Included patients and families in the planning of their care Does an excellent job educating patients and their families
Worked well with the healthcare team to meet patient and family needs Made patients and their families feel comfortable
Establishes a special connection with patients and families through trust and emotional support
Interacted with patients, families, and staff in a professional and personable manner Demonstrated excellent critical evaluation skills
Consistently served as a role model for the nurse profession Displayed empathy and demonstrated a caring attitude