Ina Cortes
July 2025
Ina
Cortes
,
BSN, RN, CCRN
ICU
Novant Health Presbyterian Medical Center
Charlotte
,
NC
United States
Ina can actively listen, and the staff feel heard and validated. She will also bring up timely ICU/critical care topics to gauge staff opinions on current practice issues affecting the ICU.
Ina Cortes is the Assistant Nurse Manager for the ICU. She is an Extraordinary Nurse leader who continually exhibits professional behavior in her interactions with patients, staff, and visitors. Ina has worked to create an environment in the ICU that allows for open dialogue with staff. The team feels comfortable approaching Ina with any issues or concerns.
She has a PI project to improve the health of the ICU work environment. The Healthy Work Environment Project (HWE) requires yearly surveys of the staff to collect data regarding six categories: skilled communication, true collaboration, effective decision making, appropriate staffing, meaningful recognition, and authentic leadership. Through this HWE project, she was able to advocate for ICU APPs at night, which helped to improve communication between providers and the nursing staff. The goal of this project is to work toward Beacon Recognition from the American Association of Critical Care Nurses. This award would be a symbol of excellence for the ICU. Ina is currently working on the Beacon application.
Ina displays authentic leadership daily. She can have difficult conversations with staff without feeling punitive, but making it more collaborative, and the team members are able to grow from the experience. Her “open door” policy encourages staff to seek her guidance or vent without hesitation. I often find multiple staff members sitting in Ina’s office having lunch. Ina can actively listen, and the staff feel heard and validated. She will also bring up timely ICU/critical care topics to gauge staff opinions on current practice issues affecting the ICU.
Ina is a great educator who looks for fun, creative ways to educate the staff. Her first education project was a “Kahoots” game that brought healthy competition and education to difficult concepts to the ICU. Some of the topics that she addressed in the game were DKA, shock, and ARDS. She and another team member have created a 4-hour class on GI hemorrhage, sepsis, and DKA. These classes involved a didactic portion and a skills portion. It was one of the best classes that I have attended at Novant Health. These classes provide CEUs for the nurses. Anecdotally, these educational opportunities have improved morale for the team and improved outcomes for the patients. She regularly encourages the nurses to reach goals such as CCRN or the clinical ladder.
Prior to being an assistant nurse manager, Ina was the chairperson of the ICU Shared Governance committee. She is still active in the hospital-wide committee, and she participates in the unit-based meetings. Ina is also the co-chair of the CC BPET committee.
Ina has addressed the emotional toll that can happen when working in the ICU high-stress environment by offering “tea time” every month to the staff. This is a time for staff to come together and self-reflect on topics/prompts that Ina has created. The staff do not need to share their responses, which creates a safe, supportive environment to reflect on the work we all do daily. The feedback from staff has been overwhelmingly positive.
She has a PI project to improve the health of the ICU work environment. The Healthy Work Environment Project (HWE) requires yearly surveys of the staff to collect data regarding six categories: skilled communication, true collaboration, effective decision making, appropriate staffing, meaningful recognition, and authentic leadership. Through this HWE project, she was able to advocate for ICU APPs at night, which helped to improve communication between providers and the nursing staff. The goal of this project is to work toward Beacon Recognition from the American Association of Critical Care Nurses. This award would be a symbol of excellence for the ICU. Ina is currently working on the Beacon application.
Ina displays authentic leadership daily. She can have difficult conversations with staff without feeling punitive, but making it more collaborative, and the team members are able to grow from the experience. Her “open door” policy encourages staff to seek her guidance or vent without hesitation. I often find multiple staff members sitting in Ina’s office having lunch. Ina can actively listen, and the staff feel heard and validated. She will also bring up timely ICU/critical care topics to gauge staff opinions on current practice issues affecting the ICU.
Ina is a great educator who looks for fun, creative ways to educate the staff. Her first education project was a “Kahoots” game that brought healthy competition and education to difficult concepts to the ICU. Some of the topics that she addressed in the game were DKA, shock, and ARDS. She and another team member have created a 4-hour class on GI hemorrhage, sepsis, and DKA. These classes involved a didactic portion and a skills portion. It was one of the best classes that I have attended at Novant Health. These classes provide CEUs for the nurses. Anecdotally, these educational opportunities have improved morale for the team and improved outcomes for the patients. She regularly encourages the nurses to reach goals such as CCRN or the clinical ladder.
Prior to being an assistant nurse manager, Ina was the chairperson of the ICU Shared Governance committee. She is still active in the hospital-wide committee, and she participates in the unit-based meetings. Ina is also the co-chair of the CC BPET committee.
Ina has addressed the emotional toll that can happen when working in the ICU high-stress environment by offering “tea time” every month to the staff. This is a time for staff to come together and self-reflect on topics/prompts that Ina has created. The staff do not need to share their responses, which creates a safe, supportive environment to reflect on the work we all do daily. The feedback from staff has been overwhelmingly positive.