Few, if any, new nurse graduates walk onto a hospital unit on their first day brimming with confidence, much less clinical expertise. Thus, new grad residency programs help transition nurses from the world of textbooks to the realities of the bedside.
At UMass Memorial Health, new grads can find a wealth of support in the organization’s graduate residency program, which accepted its first cohort in 2007. Two campuses, University and Memorial, host the program.
Year-long program
The one-year program has various components. During the first 13 weeks of the program, new grads are establishing their foundational practice, notes Karen Uttaro, MS, RN, NPD-BC, NEA-BC, senior director, professional practice, quality and regulatory readiness, UMass Memorial Medical Center. Nurses are placed in a unit, based on their skill set and where a position may be vacant, and assigned a preceptor.
Working with the preceptor, they refine the skills learned in nursing school. What’s more, the new grads meet weekly with fellow new grads and members of the nursing leadership team. The 13 weeks are an average time, which can be tailored to individual needs until a nurse can practice independently.
Besides working with a preceptor, the new grads attend class weekly, where “we have a chance to emphasize key components around clinical skills,” says Uttaro. “It’s that sense of community and support. And that’s the undercurrent and the foundation of our program, to really make sure that they feel supported,” she says.
After that first 13-week component, new grads have a monthly three-hour check-in. Instructors review a topic, such as mock resuscitation, or bring in a subject matter expert, notes Uttaro. “It’s really building on their knowledge and skills throughout that whole first year,” she says. Finally, at the end of the year, the new grads have conversations about their professional goals to foster life-long learning.
Learning from each other
Not only do the new grads learn from the seasoned nurses, but the reverse also is true, notes Uttaro. “Our seasoned nurses know the new grads will teach them just as much as the seasoned nurses are going to teach our novices because they have strengths in both generations.” For instance, baby boomers and Gen Xers may not be as strong in evidence-based practice and where you find those resources, Uttaro notes, whereas Gen Z’s and millennials are very savvy with that information. “It’s establishing that common ground that they’re going to get something from each.”
One new grad who went through the program, Brittany Garlisi, BSN, RN, says that she was under the misconception of the old axiom that “Nurses eat their young.” But when she was paired with one of the oldest nurses on her unit, “I was pleasantly surprised to find that they were one of the most kind and nurturing teachers I could have had.”
Striking gold
As a new grad, Danyel Stone, BSN, RN, CCRN found support in the program. Having graduated from nursing school in December 2020, she started in the new grad program in March 2021.
“It’s a lot to start off as a new RN, especially because I feel like 80-90% of the job you will learn in person while you’re working,” she says. “Starting off as a new nurse, I was very, very nervous going into it. And I think that being part of the residency program really helped me stay grounded.”
Coming from a previous career as a securities broker, Garlisi felt anxious about working as a new nurse. “I felt that even though I had the book knowledge, I did not have much of the practical knowledge. So it made me very nervous to be doing a lot of things for the first time as a registered nurse as opposed to being oriented and having a support network to really teach me.”
“I thought I was just signing up for some kind of mentorship but I really felt that I struck gold. It really was way better than I could have anticipated.”
Growing program
Typically, notes Uttaro, each cohort has 50 new grads. Each year, the hospital supports three cohorts, one starting in March, then August, then December. This year, Uttaro expects to have as many as 150 new grads, with a target of 200 to 250 new grads in 2023.
Impact of COVID
As with virtually every aspect of healthcare, COVID threw a wrench into the residency program.
The cohort that was to start the program in March 2020 couldn’t go onto the units. Instead, the new grads worked as a prone team. “We found a different role for them to leverage their nursing knowledge,” says Uttaro. “And we were able to foster skills like leadership and teamwork and communication.”
Because many new grads lost out on clinical time during COVID, notes Uttaro, the program re-emphasized skills the grads didn’t get.
Measuring success
The program can measure success in two ways, notes Uttaro. First, in November 2021, the program achieved accreditation from the ANCC Practice Transition Accreditation Program (PTAP). “So we have the external validation that our program is evidence-based and meets the rigorous criteria of that organization,” Uttaro says.
Second, retention of new grads pre-pandemic was 100% at the one-year mark, 92% at the two-year mark, and 88% at the three-year mark, according to Uttaro. “We retained our novice nurses for the long haul,” she notes. “I think it’s really planting the seed and being that coach for them that keeps them in our village,” she says.
Fostering respectful communication is one hallmark of the program. “Most of the bad things that happen in healthcare are a result of communication breakdown,” Uttaro says. “In this program, and throughout the organization, we emphasize asking questions in a respectful way. If it doesn’t feel right in your gut, you don’t need to know why, you just need to know whom to talk to. Being able to say, ‘I think something isn’t right,’ really reinforces that communication is essential to all aspects of your practice.”
Healthcare is a very complex environment right now, notes Uttaro, “and making sure that the new grads are positioned for success is our top priority.”
Karen Giuliano, PhD, MSN, associate professor at the Elaine Marieb College of Nursing and the UMass Institute for Applied Life Sciences (IALS), and Dian Baker, professor emeritus at Sacramento State University, will lead a two-year, interdisciplinary trial in partnership with two Illinois hospitals — the University of Illinois School of Nursing and Hospital and Northwest Community Hospital – and the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry.
Research has shown that in the first 48 hours after patients are hospitalized, germs can move from the mouth into the lungs, causing pneumonia. Giuliano and Baker have spearheaded NVHAP (non-ventilator hospital-acquired pneumonia) research to investigate risk factors and how to reduce them.
Karen Giuliano, PhD, MSN, MBA.
“Oral health is critical to overall health, and oral hygiene protocols are a key factor in reducing NVHAP,” said Lora Vitek, executive director of Delta Dental of Illinois Foundation. “We work to improve the health and well-being of Illinoisans, and this grant will provide data to help Delta Dental of Illinois Foundation and our hospital partners in the state do just that.”
“We expect that there will be a significant reduction in NVHAP incidence in acute care patients who receive a standardized oral care intervention as compared to acute care patients who do not,” adds Giuliano, co-director of the newly created Elaine Marieb Center for Nursing and Engineering Innovation.
In their ongoing research, Giuliano and Baker have found that NVHAP represents 60% of hospital-acquired cases, affecting approximately one in 100 hospitalized patients and carries an associated crude mortality rate of 13-30%. NVHAP also is associated with increased antibiotic usage, high ICU utilization rates, high readmission rates of 20% for survivors and is the most common pathway to sepsis, an often-fatal infection.
While quality improvement initiatives at hospitals over the past decade have focused successfully on reducing cases of ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP), there are no regulations requiring hospitals to address NVHAP. As a result, patients, especially those who are non-ventilated and critically ill, remain at significant risk.
“Understanding mechanisms that reduce the incidence of NVHAP remains of paramount importance,” Giuliano says. “In the face of COVID, this issue has assumed an even higher level of importance.”
Mothers inspire daughters in untold ways, including choice of profession. However, that dynamic takes on special meaning when the profession is nursing during a pandemic – and when the mother and daughter work at the same organization.
Such is the case with Jonna Dube, MBA, BSN, RN and her daughter Alex Dube, BSN, RN.
After graduating with a BSN in 2019 from Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, Alex was hired as a new graduate nurse on the inpatient pediatric floor at UMass Memorial Health.
Then, COVID-19 hit, and Alex’s career path took an unexpected turn.
“I was so happy that we were able to go to the COVID ICUs and be that extra helping hand, because that’s what nursing is.”
Instead of starting her new graduate program to care for children, Alex wound up with her fellow graduate nurses helping patients in COVID units. Most of her time was spent on the newly established prone team, where she worked with other nurses and respiratory therapists to get intubated, sedated COVID patients into a prone position to improve their respiration.
“Going from what I thought was going to be working on the pediatric unit to the adult ICU couldn’t have been more opposite from what I expected going into nursing,” Alex said in an interview. But “it was such a good idea to take all the new graduate nurses and put them where they needed us. That’s what nursing is. It’s being helpful when needed, where needed. I was so happy that we were able to go to the COVID ICUs and be that extra helping hand where they needed us because that’s what nursing is.”
Alex admits she felt scared as a new nurse who never worked in an ICU before. But, she says, she was proud to be able to help take care of these COVID patients.
Following mom’s footsteps
Alex says that her mom’s influence “absolutely” played a role in inspiring her to take up nursing.
“My mom is one of the only ones in our immediate family in the medical field,” Alex says. Alex admired her mom for being the go-to person for medical concerns. “I always admired her for that and I always wanted to do that. I wanted to be someone who can be helpful and have a job where you make a difference every day. My mom was always that person and I always knew I wanted to do that in any capacity, and nursing just seemed like the best way that I could help as many people as I could.”
“Nursing just seemed like the best way that I could help as many people as I could.”
When learning that her daughter wanted to become a nurse, “honestly my first response was just joy,” says Jonna, obviously proud of her daughter. “Alex puts 100% into everything that she does and helping people is such a gift. I always say I’m so happy for the patients and for the community because she’s a great person and she’s an even better nurse. I was thrilled that she wanted to go into nursing,” Jonna says.
A nurse at UMass Memorial since 2002 when she was an emergency department RN in the new grad program, Jonna currently serves as senior director, government program operations and care pathways. In this position, she works to ensure exceptional care for patients during a 90-day continuum related to the Medicare bundled payment initiative, ensuring they avoid emergency department readmissions.
At the start of the pandemic, Jonna opened a nurse triage command center with 10 nurses from the organization. The center took calls from patients in the community who had COVID symptoms or questions, triaged them, and sent them for testing if they met criteria. The team then delivered all of the results as well as education.
“This was my proudest and most rewarding endeavor as a nurse and as a leader at UMass Memorial Health that I was blessed to be a part of,” Jonna says. “We were not at the bedside, but we definitely had a huge impact on mitigating emergency department visits as well as stopping the spread of the virus through education.”
Return to peds
This past summer, Alex transitioned to pediatrics, where today she works as a staff nurse. She also currently is a student at MCPHS University in the family nurse practitioner master’s program.
Alex admits times have been challenging. “I don’t know any other nursing,” she says. “Pandemic nursing is kind of all I know.”
However, she remains enthusiastic and optimistic. “As challenging as it’s always been, it’s never made me question what I’m doing,” Alex says. “I knew going in that my whole job was to help other people. And we still get to do that. It’s gotten harder and it gets difficult sometimes. But our goal is to help the public and that’s what we keep doing, as challenging as it is.”
“I’ve never worked harder than I have these past two years, but I’ve never been more motivated or inspired by the work that we’re doing today.”
Jonna credits her organization’s senior leadership with helping staff through these tough times. “The leadership has been so uplifting, inspiring. They kept the communication going. They’ve helped us to make sure that it’s really important that we take care of ourselves right now so that we can take care of other people.”
“We’re just really blessed to be able to make a difference in people’s lives every day,” Jonna says, echoing her daughter. “And that’s what inspires me. I’ve never worked harder than I have these past two years, but I’ve never been more motivated or inspired by the work that we’re doing today.”
For their determination, courage, negotiating chops, and commitment to their patients and nursing excellence, this week surely belongs to the 700 nurses of St Vincent Hospital in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Our Nurses of the Week are ready to “come home” after successfully resolving the longest US nursing strike in 15 years – and the longest ever in Massachusetts history. St Vincent’s nurses, the MNA union, Tenet Healthcare, and St Vincent officials all sound relieved and ready to move past their epic 301-day fight. In a secret ballot on Monday, 487 out of 502 nurses voted to approve the new contract. This effectively puts an end to their marathon struggle for safer staffing ratios – and the subsequent fight to protect strikers from being penalized for taking action.
St Vincent seems to be rolling out the Welcome mat. Hospital officials are ready to recall strikers to their previous positions, are scheduling them for reorientation, and anticipate that everyone will be back at work by January 22.
Hospital spokesman Matt Clyburn stated, “We are ready to welcome back every nurse who chooses to return, and we have plans in place to make that process as smooth as possible.” He heralded the reconciliation and emphasized that both hospital and nurses are eager to “renew our focus on the values we share and the commitments we make to one another as colleagues. And we will work diligently to heal the wounds of the past year as we integrate striking nurses, nurses who have been taking great care of our patients during the strike, and the rest of our excellent staff.”
MNA celebrates “An enormous victory for our patients and our members”
Marlena Pellegrino, RN, a 35-year nurse at St Vincent and co-chair of the nurses local bargaining unit of the Massachusetts Nurses Association (MNA) union was jubilant and proud of the outcome. “This is an enormous victory for our patients and our members, and it is a testament to the grit and determination of every nurse who walked that line, day in and day out, through four seasons, 18 hours a day, in snow, pouring rain, through blazing heat and stifling humidity – all for the good of our community.”
Pellegrino described the mood of staff and management by saying, “Our eyes are focused on the future, on returning to our home and to the hospital bedside to do what we love the most – which is to provide the high-quality care our patients expect and deserve.”
Dominique Muldoon, RN, a nurse at the hospital and co-chair of the bargaining unit, agreed: “With this agreement, we can go back into that building with great pride not just in what we got in writing in the agreement, but for what we have built together as nurses who know they did everything they could for their patients and their community.”
A long, hard battle for better patient care
St Vincent nurses resorted to the strike after two years of deadlock with Tenet Healthcare. In November 2019, the nurses began campaigning for staff increases, contending that the staffing shortage was no mere workaday inconvenience. In their view – even before the pandemic – the lack of nurses had become unsustainable and endangered patient lives.
The calls for reform fell on deaf ears, though, even as Covid started cutting its way through the community. When Covid continued filling the hospital with unvaccinated prey, 700 St Vincent nurses opted for a more aggressive mode of treatment. Under the aegis of the Massachusetts Nurses Association union (MNA), they went on strike on March 8, 2021.
As the MNA account puts it, the St Vincent nurses’ March 2021 action initiated “the longest nurses strike in Massachusetts history, with more than nine months of picketing, community rallies and marches, tremendous support from federal, state, and municipal public officials who rallied to the nurses’ cause. The St Vincent strike also garnered the support of faith-based, social justice and labor organizations and their members not only from across the state but from across the world.”
Such support is not common during industrial strikes, and strikers often encounter violent opposition from all quarters. But when members of the most trusted profession strike, the public response can be more thoughtful and nuanced. One distinctive aspect of many nursing strikes is that patients are a vital part of the equation. When nurses are subjected to poor wages and dangerous working conditions, it has a direct impact on patient safety — and for most, being a nurse and caring for patients are virtually synonymous. So, a nursing strike can administer a salutary shock to the system. To quote one of the more popular picket signs, “If nurses are out HERE, something is wrong in THERE.”
Agreed: a limit of four-patient assignments on the hospital’s cardiac post-surgical unit.
Prior to the strike, these nurses were often assigned five patients, with no ability to reduce an assignment based on the needs of the patients.
Agreed: there will be a mix of four- and five-patient assignments on the seven other medical-surgical and telemetry floors, including a limit of four patient assignments on the day and evening shift on the two cardiac telemetry floors.
Prior to the strike, these nurses were assigned five patients nearly every day and every shift, with no ability to reduce an assignment based on the needs of the patients.
Agreed: no more than five patients assigned to each nurse on the behavioral health unit.
Prior to the strike, these nurses including the resource nurse were regularly assigned six patients.
The agreement also includes language that limits the hospital’s ability to flex nurses, a controversial process where a nurse can be sent home when the employer determines he or she is not needed, which too often has left the nurses still working with unsafe patient assignments after an influx of admissions later in the shift.
However, the St Vincent nurses are very clear that work remains in other areas including the maternity unit as well as the emergency department. “We will now work to make progress in all areas inside the building and hope Tenet leadership commits to doing the same,” said Marie Ritacco, RN, a member of the nurses negotiating committee and vice president of the MNA.
Protections against workplace violence
The new agreement includes language which the nurses have sought for a number of years regarding workplace violence. Nurses are subject to assault on the job to the same degree as police officers and prison guards.
The added language provides two RN seats on the Hospital Workplace Safety Committee, adds new language committing the committee to work to monitor and address issues related to workplace violence, requires the hospital to staff and maintain a metal detector to screen all patients and visitors in the busy ED, and adds contractually enforceable additional staffing by a police detail during the night shift seven days a week and on all three shifts on weekends and holidays.
The agreement also provides “assault pay,” for a nurse who is assaulted by a patient or visitor. A nurse who receives workers’ compensation and who uses sick or vacation pay as the result of a workplace assault for the first five days will have such time restored to their sick/vacation time off bank.
Wages and Benefits
One of the most important enhancements was the nurses’ ability to obtain significantly enhanced health insurance benefit for part-time nurses with all nurses who work 24-hours or more receiving a premium with Tenet paying 80% of the cost, up from 65% for 24-hour nurses previously, which keeps pace with the benefit for nurses working at UMass Memorial Medical Center.
As to wages, here are some highlights from the contract:
2% across the board increases each year of the contract, commencing with the first increase January 1, 2021 and the last increase June 30, 2025;
Effective August 1, 2021 each nurse not at the max step advances one step (which results in nurses advancing 2 steps in 2021); 1% lump sum bonus for nurses at the top of the wage scale as of December 31, 2021.
Nurses on the scale will see increases totaling 28% in combined annual across the board and annual step increases, and nurses at max will see 10% in across the board increases and an additional 1% lump sum on base wages based on pay rate on December 31 ,2021.
Per Diem nurses will receive 3% increases each year of the contract, totaling 15% increases.
Two options for a 3% lump sum bonus to be paid June 2022: Nurses can opt for a 3% lump sum of 2021 W2 wages, or 3% lump sum bonus based on 2020 W2 wages whichever is greater.
If ratified the contract will run from Jan. 3, 2021– Dec. 31, 2025 and includes 2 years of retroactive pay (2020 and 2021).
“It feels like we’re going home”
After casting their ballots, the nurses celebrated their victory but mainly looked to the future.
Deb McCrohon, RN, said, “It felt amazing after such a long standout and thinking this day would never come. I’m looking forward to getting back in there and getting back to my patients.”
PACU (Post Anesthesia Care Unit) nurse Debbie Flagg, RN, a Daisy Award winner, added, “It feels like we’re going home. It’s been a long year.”
Since March of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic has put an unprecedented strain on the American health care system as large surges of intensive care unit patients overwhelmed hospitals. Facing this challenge, Boston’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) expanded ICU capacity by 93 percent and maintained surge conditions during the nine weeks in the spring of 2020.
In a pair of papers and a guest editorial published in Dimensions of Critical Care Nursing, a team of nurse-scientists at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) share their experiences nearly doubling the hospital’s intensive care unit capacity; identifying, training and redeploying staff; and developing and implementing a proning team to manage patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome during the first COVID-19 surge.
“As COVID-19 was sweeping through the nation, we at BIDMC were preparing for the projected influx of highly infectious, critically ill patients,” said lead author Sharon C. O’Donoghue, DNP, RN, a nurse specialist in the medical intensive care units at BIDMC. “It rapidly became apparent that a plan for the arrival of highly infectious critically ill patients as well as a strategy for adequate staffing protecting employees and assuring the public that this could be managed successfully were needed.”
After establishing a hospital incident command structure to clearly define roles, open up lines of communication and develop surge plans, BIDMC leadership began planning for the impending influx of patients with COVID-19 in February 2020.
BIDMC – a 673 licensed bed teaching hospital affiliated with Harvard Medical School – has nine specialty ICUs located on two campuses for a total of 77 ICU beds. Informed by an epidemic surge drill conducted at BIDMC in 2012, leadership determined that the trigger to open extra ICU space would be when 70 ICU beds were occupied. When this milestone was met on March 31, 2020, departmental personnel had a 12-hour window to convert two 36-bed medical-surgical units into additional ICU space, providing an additional 72 beds.
“Because the medical-surgical environment is not designed to deliver an ICU level of care, many modifications needed to be made and the need for distancing only added to the difficulties,” said senior author Susan DeSanto-Madeya, PhD, RN, FAAN, a Beth Israel Hospital Nurses Alumna Association endowed nurse scientist. “Many of these rooms were originally designed for patient privacy and quiet, but a key safety element in critical care is patient visibility, so we modified the spaces to accommodate ICU workflow.”
Modifications included installing windows in all patient room doors, and repositioning beds and monitors so patients and screens could be easily seen without entering the room. Lines of visibility were augmented with mirrors and baby monitor systems as necessary. To further minimize staff exposure to the virus, care providers were given two-way radios to decrease the number of staff required to enter a room when hands-on patient care was necessary. Mobile supply carts and workstations helped improved overall workflow efficiency.
In addition to stockpiling and managing medical equipment including personal protective equipment (PPE), ventilators and oxygen, increasing ICU capacity also required redeploying 150 staff trained in critical care. The hospital developed a recall list for former ICU nurses. Further, medical-surgical nurses that could bring their skills to care for critically ill patients on teams with veteran ICU nurses were also identified.
Redeployment of staff required education and support. In-person, socially-distanced workshops were developed for each group, after which nurses were assigned to shadow an ICU nurse to reduce anxiety, practice new skills and gain confidence.
“Staff identified the shadow experience as being most beneficial in preparing them for deployment during the COVID-19 surge,” said O’Donoghue. “Historically, BIDMC has had strong collaborative relationships with staff from different areas and these relationships proved to be vital to the success of all the care teams. The social work department played a major role in fostering teams, especially during difficult situations.”
One of the redeployment teams was the ICU proning team, brought together to support bedside clinicians by facilitating safe and timely prone positioning. Proning is an intervention known to improve oxygenation in patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome – a key feature of severe COVID-19 – that is complex, takes time and is not without its potential dangers to the patient and staff alike. The coalition maximized resources and facilitated more than 160 interventions between March and May of 2020.
“Although the pandemic was an unprecedented occurrence, it has prepared us for potential future crises requiring the collaboration of multidisciplinary teams to ensure optimal outcomes in an overextended environment,” O’Donoghue said. “BIDMC’s staff rose to the challenge, and many positive lessons were learned from this difficult experience.”
“We must continue to be vigilant in our assessment of what worked and what did not work and look for ways to improve health care delivery in all our systems,” said DeSanto-Madeya, who is also an associate professor at the College of Nursing at the University of Rhode Island. “The memories from this past year and a half cannot be forgotten, and we can move forward confidently knowing we provided the best care possible despite all the hardships.”
Co-authors included Jacqueline Hardman, BSN, RN; Joanna Anderson, BSN, RN, CCRN, CNRN; Jane Foley, DNP, RN; Jean Gillis, MSN, RN; Kimberly Maloof, MSN, RN; Andrea Milano, MSN, RN, CCRN, CMC; John Whitlock, MS, RN; Meghan Church, DPT; Kristin Russell, BSN, RN; Kelly A. Gamboa, DNP, RN, CNOR; Jennifer Sarge, BSN, RN, Ari Moskowitz, MD; Margaret M. Hayes, MD, ATSF; and Michael N. Cocchi, MD, of BIDMC.
The authors disclosed that they have no significant relationships with or financial interest in any commercial companies pertaining to this article.
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center is a patient care, teaching and research affiliate of Harvard Medical School and consistently ranks as a national leader among independent hospitals in National Institutes of Health funding. BIDMC is the official hospital of the Boston Red Sox.
Our Nurse of the Week, Phyllis Garr, BSN, RN, a pre-op holding nurse at Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital’s Department of Nursing is yet another standout DAISY Award recipient. She was nominated by a fellow nurse-turned-patient – who remarked, “I know a Daisy nurse when I see one!”
As it happens, the patient who nominated Garr is a nurse leader at another Magnet recognized hospital in New England, so she sets a fairly high bar for nursing excellence. In her nomination letter, the patient wrote:
I sought treatment for my cancer through Dana-Faber and had surgery (twice) at BWFH. My surgeon shared that the nursing care at the “Friendly Faulkner” was incredible. I was blessed to have Phyllis assigned to me during my second surgery.
Keep in mind I have been on the “other side of the sheets” for 35 years as a nurse and this is really my very first illness.
I had to come back to the OR for an unexpected revision. Phyllis’s care was truly exceptional. She asked questions about the first surgery, how I had recovered, how I felt about this new turn and how I was doing emotionally. She was kind, warm, and, dare I say, loving during the whole stay. When she found out that I worked at a Magnet organization she shared information about your journey and even allowed me to read the parts of your document related to the ambulatory surgery unit.
She made my care personal and certainly over the top. I serve on our DAISY team here at my hospital and I know a Magnet facility when I see it and I sure do know a DAISY nurse when I see one. I am coming back soon for my reconstruction surgery and actually have very little apprehension as I know I am in great hands.
Garr is more accustomed to being on the other side of the DAISY Award process, as she is a member of Brigham and Women’s Nursing Professional Recognition and Advancement Committee.
This time the spotlight was on her own deep commitment, though, and members of nursing leadership, fellow members of the Nursing Professional Recognition and Advancement Committee, and her supportive co-workers were only too happy to see her holding the famous Healer’s Touch sculpture. It was a delightful and well-earned turnabout: “As a member of this committee, I give this award to extraordinary nurses. Never once did I think I would be on the receiving end of this prestigious international award with all the history behind it!” she said of the honor.
During the presentation, Chief Nursing Officer and Vice President of Patient Care Services Cori Loescher, MM, BSN, RN, NEA-BC, recalled meeting Garr’s patient at the 2019 ANCC National Magnet Conference. “She sought me out to tell me how wonderful her experience was,” says Loescher. “You truly were her DAISY angel.”
Garr also encountered her patient at the Magnet conference. “I was in a convention center with 10,000 other nurses and I looked over and there she was!” she says. “It is very meaningful to have been nominated for the DAISY Award by someone who knows first-hand what excellence in nursing looks like.”
The DAISY Award, established by the DAISY Foundation, is named in memory of J. Patrick Barnes who died at the age of 33 from Idiopathic Thrombocytopenic Purpura (ITP), an auto-immune disease. The Barnes Family was inspired by the care that Patrick received and established this unique program to recognize and thank the nurses nationwide who make a profound difference in the lives of their patients and families.
St Vincent nurses resorted to the strike after two years of deadlock with Tenet Healthcare. In November 2019, the nurses began campaigning for staff increases, contending that the staffing shortage was no mere workaday inconvenience. In their view – even before the pandemic – the lack of nurses had become unsustainable and endangered patient lives.
