Thursday, October 27th, 2022
Today could not have gotten more full or more amazing! First, five boxes of supplies were delivered to Hospital Catarino Reves. They contained supplies mostly for the NICU, but also for the pediatric emergency room (oxygen masks, tubing and nasal cannulas) and random supplies for the adult emergency room. In the box for the adult ER were several oxygen bags and masks. When the box was opened by the Director of Pediatrics, he quickly grabbed a bag and mask giving it to someone to take directly to the ER. He said, " Someone just called looking for a bag and mask to be used immediately. They didn't have any more. This will be life-saving now." The NICU supplies included medications needed every day, 1cc syringes and laryngoscopes and blades. These are items that the unit has been needing for weeks.
While that was happening, our respiratory therapist, Arun, was visiting the Social Security Hospital (which serves the workers) and working with their NICU staff. He was so pleased to see the changes in respiratory management since our last visit to the unit. As always, they were very receptive to his suggestions and ideas, putting them into place immediately.
The focus of today, though, was the first step in training four NICU nurses as STABLE certification course instructors. The topics of glucose and temperature control, respiratory management, blood pressure management and lab values were all presented to a group of 10 nurses. The instructors-in-training were amazing to watch! The passion for their work shone through.
At the end of the day, the new instructors were presented with all the AV equipment they will need to continue to teach. This included laptops, projectors, screens and a microphone and speaker set. They were so excited to begin to think about the next teaching opportunity.
One of today's participants shared the following: "I have been a nursery nurse my whole career. I love the babies. I worked for years in the Neo B unit at Catarino. When they asked me to become the nurse educator, I was hesitant because I felt someone needed to take of these babies. But I knew God was calling me to something new. What I decided was that this would become my legacy. I would teach new nurses how to care for these babies. But what to teach? Today gave me what I needed. This material, this information, will be my material. You have given me my legacy."
Doesn't get better than that!!
Stay tuned...one more day of work to do.
~Patti Wagner, Medical Director
