Pam is an extraordinary nursing leader who began her nursing journey at MSSN 2011. She is a certified Wound Ostomy and Continence Nurse. Throughout her time at MSSN, she has functioned as a Wound and Ostomy Care Nurse, Consultant, Educator, and Expert in her field. She is highly respected by Providers, her peers, the nursing staff, and all disciplines. This candidate is a decisive leader, patient advocate, collaborator, role model, and extremely hard worker. She provides countless hours of devoting care to her patients and empowering those around her. These attributes and many more reflect an expert nurse with a career of over 30 years.

This nominee demonstrates and actively engages in the professional development of herself and others in the nursing profession. As reflected by her educational advancement, this nominee is truly a lifelong learner. She promotes staff development from orientation to continuing education to formal education and professional certification. She has a special passion for guiding and coaching. This candidate fosters a dynamic environment that promotes a culture of empowerment. As a staunch advocate of nurses and nursing, this candidate demonstrates leadership that is based on knowledge and recognition of the challenges of daily bedside patient care. Her calm and confident demeanor helps staff maintain focus and provide the best possible care. She is never too busy to help staff with clinical issues and problem-solving.

Our nominee serves dually as a patient advocate and staff advocate. She actively supports positive patient outcomes and a positive nursing practice environment. This nominee leads and co-leads numerous committees, including the Pressure Injury Prevention Committee. Through all her committee work, she is actively supporting nursing. She demonstrates significant achievements that have advanced the practice of nursing, improved patient outcomes, enhanced the nursing work environment, and promotes multi-disciplinary teamwork. Initiatives she has spearheaded include implementation of the Prevelon Boot and the Air Tap. She coordinated a bed fair ensuring our patients are provided with the highest quality mattresses. With this candidate’s leadership and support, we have many nursing units that have identified a decrease in Pressure Injuries. In the previous year, there were numerous units with many months of HAPIs significantly below the benchmark. This candidate is continuously updating her teaching content based on feedback she gathers from staff who attend her programs, hospital data, metrics, and current practice standards in her specialty in order to provide a meaningful learning event for the staff. She travels off-site every other week to provide Pressure Injury Prevention classes to our newly hired Nurses and PCTs in orientation. In addition, once the orientees are in the hospital, she provides an additional class on Management of Pressure Injury to provide additional support and education. This candidate hosts a Prevention of Pressure Injury class for our local nursing students to prepare them for the clinical environment and welcome and invite them to be part of the prevention team. Instructors and students boast about this class which allows them to participate in return demonstrations, handle the product line and ask questions in a safe learning environment.

Additionally, this candidate provides lectures to our community Ostomy Support Group. This candidate’s knowledge and care of our patients suffering from challenging wounds and ostomies and her focus on putting our patients first reach past the walls of our hospital. She has been known to travel to physician’s offices, our wound center, and nursing homes to troubleshoot problematic ostomies. The journey for a patient with a new or challenging ostomy or wound is not an easy one, and this WOCN has been known many times to make follow-up phone calls to ensure the patient/family is confident and managing well when outside the walls of our hospital.

Another important role this nominee holds is that of expert clinical representative in legal situations involving wounds, pressure injuries, and ostomies. She speaks to, explains, and defends our nursing care and standards of practice. The time and preparation this requires often has her working past her required hours sorting through medical records so that she is well-versed and prepared for intense questioning. At times, she is called to defend patients she has not been called upon to see. Her only defense is the nurse’s documentation. She works diligently to ensure the medical record is thoroughly explained.

A personal story with this candidate was shared with me. This individual received a desperate phone call from her very strong, independent mother asking for immediate help as she had hurt herself and could not stop the bleeding. When she arrived, she found her mother with her leg elevated with a large, deep bleeding wound. She refused to go to the hospital. This individual immediately called this nominee for guidance and support. She excused herself from teaching a class to answer the panicked call, review the pictures texted to her, and guide her in the care needed to be provided. This nominee then made a point of stopping by her mother’s house on her way home to assess for herself the wound and if a higher level of care and assessment was needed. This individual knew the candidate as a colleague only. This level of attention was far above the ‘call of duty’. Her attentiveness, professional assessment, and explanations reassured both her and her mother. Each day, she would reach out to ask for a current picture of when healing was not happening as quickly as she had expected. She referred us to a physician with whom she consulted on our behalf, and we were able to meet with him in no time. Her mother was back to her normal physical activities with a scar and a story and an eternally grateful heart that this candidate gave her.

This was shared from another WOCN: This candidate’s “leadership and mentorship inspire me to strive for excellence in my own practice. Knowing that she is there to support and guide me gives me the confidence to pursue new challenges and opportunities. Her unwavering support has been invaluable to me, and I am grateful to have her as a mentor and role model. She truly embodies the qualities of a deserving recipient of the DAISY Lifetime Achievement Award, and I am privileged to have had the opportunity to learn from her.” Our nominee has been recognized by the nursing community as a transformational nursing leader. Her impact on the lives she has touched has been immeasurable for patients, nurses, and our organization. Our nominee is recognized by senior leadership, peers, physicians, and staff as a strong and dedicated nursing leader who instills accountability and challenges others to be their best. She leads by example. No matter how busy or hectic the day is, you can always count on her to give of herself and her time to help everyone through it together!