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NEWS RELEASE

Nurses at Ephraim McDowell Regional Medical Center’s Cardiovascular Catheterization Lab were recently honored with The DAISY Team Award for Extraordinary Nurses. The award is part of the DAISY Foundation’s program to recognize the super-human efforts nurses perform every day.

The DAISY Award for Extraordinary Nurses has been adopted by healthcare facilities around the world to celebrate nurses for their extraordinary care and compassion. The DAISY Team Award is for nurse-led teams of two or more who come together to solve a specific situation by going above and beyond. Nursing teams may be nominated by patients, families, and colleagues, and they are chosen by a committee of nurses at Ephraim McDowell Health to receive The DAISY Team Award. The DAISY Team Award is presented once each year at a surprise presentation. Each member of the Nursing Team receives a certificate commending them for being an “Extraordinary Nurse.” The certificate reads: “In deep appreciation of all you do, who you are, and the incredibly meaningful difference your teamwork makes in the lives of so many people.” The Team also receives a specially engraved plaque with the name of the Team.

The Cardiovascular Catheterization Lab nurses were nominated by an Ephraim McDowell employee that said, “I would like to recommend the Cardiac Catheterization Lab team for the Team Daisy award. The Cardiac Cath lab team has gone above and beyond as many team members have during the Covid outbreak. In March of 2020 Ephraim had closed outpatient procedures for all non-urgent cases. This caused the Cath Lab to go to a one-week on and one-week off staffing pattern due to low volumes. In May of 2020 we were able to open up our outpatient procedures again. At that time the Cath Lab team was challenged with available inpatient beds due to the volumes of Covid and other increased medical admissions.

The team began a staffing model (day by day) to prepare for any admissions without bed availability. At noon they would send two staff home to rest so they could return at 7 p.m. to care for the patients overnight. In September of 2021 the volume of Covid patients and bed availability created the team staffing to again change. At this time the team elected to have two volunteers to switch their work schedule to nights on Tuesday through Thursday. For the other days the team would volunteer to cover extra call to support for those nights we had patients admitted into the Cath Lab holding area. On weekends when they averaged one patient per weekend, they would have to admit to the Cath Lab holding area, in order to provide care for extended periods of time. With this scheduling grid, Cardiologists would schedule any patients that were at high risk for being admitted, on the days we had night shift staff scheduled. They limited volume on other days due to the staffing shortage from losing the two nurses to nights.

At this time Cardiologists changed their admissions structure for emergent cases to downgrade the patients earlier so the patient could be admitted to the Cardiovascular Unit safely. While on nights, if the team didn’t have a patient to care for in the Cath Lab, they would assist the Emergency Department or other inpatient units that were challenged with staffing shortages and high volumes. They continued this scheduling format for two months. When volumes again reduced, they returned to the day by day schedule model.

During Covid, all of health care made enormous sacrifices for the care of our patients. I don’t think the public will ever know what sacrifices we made to provide the care they required.”

Nomination forms for the DAISY Award are available at various locations throughout Ephraim McDowell Regional Medical Center, Ephraim McDowell Fort Logan Hospital, Ephraim McDowell James B. Haggin Hospital and other Ephraim McDowell facilities.