The Art of Nursing program offered some special program options which included complimentary scholarship seats, student nurse essay contests and a nursing group poster award. While all of the submissions were exceptional, the winners have been chosen.

I had an awesome ‘seat’ as I got to review and enjoy each of the applications. Such heart, passion and dedication went into the work that was submitted. The scholarship winner submitted such a beautifully crafted application, I asked her if I could share it with you and she agreed. Here are her answers to the Art of Nursing calling:

Question: Tell us why you love being a nurse. If possible, describe your favorite nursing memory (keeping patient confidentiality in mind, of course). Why do you love what you do?

Answer: I love nursing because of the profound impact we have on people’s lives. My favorite nursing memory is when a patient’s wife sought me out to let me know that I had helped save her husband’s life. He was a young man who had just had abdominal surgery. He was doing pretty well, but his respiration rate was a little high. Everything else was OK, but I remembered being taught that respiration rate is often the first sign of impending problems. I bugged the doctor all afternoon asking him to come see this patient because I just had a bad feeling about him. Finally, just before he left the hospital the doctor came up to see him and reluctantly moved him to the ICU for closer monitoring. Come to find out, the man went into respiratory failure that night and had to be intubated. His wife found me and let me know what happened. That doctor never ignored my requests ever again. Nursing intuition is a powerful thing not to be ignored. We both learned a lot about ourselves with that incident.

Now, I am a teacher of nurses and I tell that story and others from my career to give the students that feeling that they can make an impact on someone’s life. I tell them to always trust their gut feeling and never back down when they see changes, even minute ones, in their patient’s condition. There is always someone else they can call if the primary doctor will not listen. Because I get to share these powerful lessons, I love teaching nursing and being a nurse!

Question: Tell us what the Art of Nursing means to you.

Answer: The Art of Nursing is being privileged enough to hold someone’s hand when they are dying. It is seeing the look of relief when the pain medicine finally kicks in. The Art of Nursing is all the non-medical things we do to alleviate someone’s discomfort. Florence Nightingale made people aware that doctors were not washing their hands between patients so as nurses we are charged with the duty to educate people on how to prevent disease and how to stay feeling good in our body, mind and spirit. I wish we could go back to the old days when the nurse was able to sit by the bedside of the patient and talk and provide comfort that only attention can give.

Question: How come you’re interested in participating in the Art of Nursing program? Why do you want to join us? 

Answer: I am interested in participating in this program because I feel the art of nursing is being lost in all the hustle and bustle of society today. Nurses are so rushed and are being told they have so much paperwork/computer work to do that they are losing what they became nurses for…the interactions with the patients.

This program would teach me the skills I need to teach the incoming generation of nurses to be less rushed and to focus on the reasons they are becoming nurses in the first place.  It could also help me personally reconnect with my own goals as a nurse. I think this program could be awesome if the concepts of mindfulness are related to nursing. That is one of the things I hope to gain from participating in this program.

Congratulations to Lisa G. from MO. Your application brought me to tears of joy. I am so thrilled to hear how you relate to the Art of Nursing and am grateful for the work that you do.

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Let’s hear from you. What does the Art of Nursing mean to you? How do you celebrate your nursing career? Leave a comment below. Thank you for reading and enjoy the day.