Houston, MO— Texas County Memorial Hospital celebrated the work of their 92 nurses during National Nurses’ Week, May 3rd through the 7th.
Nurses’ week is celebrated annually at TCMH. Nurses work in many departments of the hospital – medical, obstetrics, emergency room, surgery, intensive care, home health, hospice and clinics.
“I want to thank all of our nurses for everything that they do every day,” Amanda Turpin, TCMH director of nursing said.
On Tuesday and Wednesday the TCMH nurse managers held a “skills lab” training session for all TCMH licensed practical nurses (LPN) and registered nurses (RN). The skills lab included 14 hands-on training activities such as medication test, crash cart, transfusions, restraints, fire safety, Stroke/STEMI, patient safety, infection control, hand washing and more.
“We had very good participation from our nurses,” Turpin noted. “97 percent of our nurses completed the skills lab.”
The nurse managers at TCMH hold the annual skills lab training during nurses’ week as a way to help nurses keep up with in-house educational needs.
The Scrubs on Site from Holden came to TCMH to allow nurses and other employees the opportunity to shop for uniforms during the day on Thursday.
Culminating Nurses’ Week, a luncheon and ceremony was held for all nurses on Friday, May 7th.
TCMH nurses Jen Terrill, obstetric RN, Shanda Melton, emergency RN, Maddy Shelley, emergency RN and Rachel Dowden, med-surg RN, were all nominated for the DAISY (Diseases Attacking the Immune System) Award. Each nominee was honored with special recognition and a DAISY pin for their nomination.
“All the nominees represent nurses that are recognized as ‘outstanding nurses’,” Turpin explained. “The DAISY Award is the highest recognition award for a RN and LPN at TCMH.”
The DAISY Award is part of the non-profit DAISY Foundation of Glen Ellen, CA. The Foundation was established by the family of J. Patrick Barnes. Patrick died at the age of 33 in late 1999 from complications of idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura, a little known but not uncommon auto-immune disease.
The care Patrick and his family received from nurses while Patrick was ill and hospitalized inspired the DAISY Award as a way of thanking nurses for making a profound difference in the lives of their patients and patient families. The DAISY Award recipient must be nominated for a specific act of extraordinary care that was experienced by the person making the nomination.
“We have a lot of great nurses at TCMH and we want to recognize the meaningful impact they have on the lives of so many people,” Angela Cox, director of obstetrics said.
From the nominees, Shanda Melton of Mountain Grove was selected as the recipient of the Spring DAISY Award. Melton has worked at TMCH for eleven years.
Wes Murray, retiring chief executive officer at TCMH, presented the award to Melton.
“I appreciate those that submitted the nominations and recognized the good acts of our TCMH nurses that were above and beyond.” Murray said.
Melton received the DAISY Award from the nomination she received from a patient’s wife.
In the nomination, the patient’s wife explained how her husband had surgery at TCMH and was sent home with a catheter. A few days later, the catheter malfunctioned and she called the emergency room. Melton took the call and verified that the emergency room had his type of catheter and told the patient’s wife she could pick it up for him. She explained how to switch the catheter bags and the instructions she gave were sufficient to fix the problem for the patient without needing to bring him back to the emergency room.
The patient’s wife further explained that Shanda was very sweet and continued to check on them the following day to ensure everything was continuing to work well. She expressed that Melton should be recognized for her excellent care and professionalism, as she was sure she had helped many others with her kind and generous spirit.
“Shanda is an outstanding and compassionate nurse who will do whatever it takes to get patients the care they need,” Turpin said. “She is very deserving of this award.”
Melton received a special DAISY Award pin; a recognition certificate, a bouquet of fresh flowers, and a hand-carved stone sculpture called “A Healer’s Touch.”
