Transcription:

Melanie Cole (Host): What makes nursing such a satisfying career and why should a person consider a career in nursing? Welcome to It's Your Health Radio with Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital. I'm Melanie Cole and I invite you to listen as we talk about a rewarding career in nursing. Joining me is Melinda Nims. She's the Clinical Manager of Telemetry Services at Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital.

Melinda, it's such a pleasure to have you join us today. Tell us your story for us. How and why did you become a nurse?

Melinda Nims, MSN, RN (Guest): Thank you Melanie for having me. This is a subject that I am absolutely passionate about. I became a nurse after I did a report on what I wanted to be when I grew up in second grade. And I knew that, that would be my work. And when I got out of high school, I went to start my pre-recs for nursing, because nursing it's not a job. It's work. Meaning that it's something that you really need to have a heart for and be passionate about serving your community, serving your fellow humans, serving those who aren't at their best, not feeling their best. And even at their end of their life. When I was in second grade, part of my report, was a letter that I wrote about what kind of nurse I wanted to be when I grew up.

And the one thing that I said that I still feel incredibly passionate about is that I want to be a nurse that when I care for a person, they see love, they feel loved. They don't just feel like I'm giving them their medication, but they feel that I care about them sincerely.

Host: What a lovely sentiment. And it is such a rewarding career, but as you said, it is difficult and you do have to have the heart for it. Sometimes Melinda, people are a little bit thoughtless. Oh, like when are you going to be a doctor? Or are you going to go to medical school? Do you get questions like that? And if you do, what do you say about them.

Melinda: I do get questions like that. I do get questions like that and the truth is nursing and medicine, being a nurse versus being a doctor are completely different. Nursing care is different than medical care. People come to the hospital for nursing care. If they could just see a physician in an office that could give them prescriptions and give them a plan for caring for themselves, everyone could do that. But when you get to a certain point of illness or level of illness, you need to come to the hospital to receive not just medical care, but the nursing care. It's a collaboration between two different entities that work together to give you a complete set of care that moves you towards wellness and being able to care for yourself again.

Host: So true and nurses are such an integral part and one of the most important parts really, and over the years, certain careers lend themselves to certain genders, right? There's not that many women in orthopedics or in thoracic surgery, things like that. More women are geared towards nursing and pediatrics, but now we're starting to see a shift in some of these things. Are more men becoming nurses, Melinda?

Melinda: Absolutely. In fact, last week I just hired two more male nurses to work with us. They're an incredible asset and I'm so happy to see that and feel very fortunate that they're choosing to come into nursing because they bring a set of skills that really align with caring for patients.

Host: I agree. I think it's cool. Whenever I see male nurses, you know, it's just, it's a little bit different. And, and I think that it's a great shift that we're seeing where everything is kind of crossing over. Tell us how it's been since COVID, how are nurses the very foundation of medicine right now holding up? How did they hold up? How did you help with your team members to keep everybody's spirits up? Because it can be really, really difficult.

Melinda: Staff have been through a very traumatic event, caring for patients and their families. Their loved ones who couldn't come in and see them while they had COVID. They've held the hands of dying patients while their family members were on FaceTime watching. That's not hyperbole. It's been very tough. And my role in that as a leader was to come alongside the staff and support and by listening, listening to what they were going through, and really hearing it and trying to give them what they needed to continue moving forward. Sometimes that was covering their lunch breaks.

Sometimes that was sitting with them after work. Sometimes it was finding more people to help and we are fortunate and that we work at a facility where even administrative assistants, the finance department, came and helped us on the units, on the COVID units, caring for these patients. As far as, how are the staff holding up?

There is some exhaustion and I would even go as far to say some PTSD as they've been through the trenches, so to speak of caring for COVID patients. So it was tough. It's still tough.

Host: You guys were the heroes and I can attest to this. Henry Mayo is such a wonderful institution, but I'm not there, but the nurses, my dad passed away from COVID and the nurses were the reason that we were able to have a last Zoom call for my whole huge family with him. You know, it wasn't the doctors that were setting that stuff up. It was the nurses that took care of him until he died. So, I really seriously applaud you all because I just know how tough that must have been. Now tell us, under normal circumstances, the health care, the multidisciplinary approach is really what so many institutions are doing now. How do you work with all the different departments and explain while you're telling us that why this is so satisfying as a nurse, when it used to be kind of, you were off in your own little world. Now you are really in so many aspects of the medical field, nurse practitioners and surgical nurses. I mean, you're everywhere. Tell us a little bit about this multidisciplinary approach.

Melinda: Well, Melanie, you've done your homework. Multi-disciplinary approach is the way to best care for patients and the way we do that here at Henry Mayo and specifically on the units that I serve, is we have what we call MDR, multidisciplinary rounding every morning, where in all the specialties, all the rehab, the pharmacist, and the nurse and the charge nurse, et cetera, get together and speak about the care of every patient and how can we move this patient forward together as a team towards independent care and being able to go home. Because no one loves living at the hospital, that's for sure. They always want to leave. So, that's how we do it by coming together every morning and discussing each of our roles. And I will tell you, the satisfaction that comes from that is seeing the patient go home. And as I speak to the patients now that as a leader, I'm able to round in the units again, and I speak to the patients about here's what your plan is for today. What are your thoughts on that? They feel like they're a part of the team.

Now it's hard when you're sick to really kind of think forward too far. So we've learned, we've got to take it one day at a time, and that's why the multidisciplinary approach every morning worked so well in caring for our patients in a way that moved them towards independence and being home where they want to be.

Host: Certainly true. Nurses are such good advocates for their patients and sometimes the really direct link, and certainly during COVID, the direct link to find out about your loved one, to find out what's going on. And I think that, that is just such a cool part of your job. So, as we wrap up, why should people consider a career in nursing? What would you like to tell them about really what a rewarding career this is?

Melinda: Melanie, this is a rewarding career and I would want everyone to hear because every day is different. If you want to be able to get up in the morning and look forward to going to an unknown day, meaning, I'm going to go. I know I'm going to be caring for patients, but I don't know what the day is going to bring. And I'm excited about how I can be a part of healing one of my fellow human beings and caring for their family in a way that I would want to be cared for if my family was ever to be in the hospital. And to have rewarding work, where you use your heart, your mind, you give every piece of you as a part of your work. There's nothing like it. There's nothing like it. And Melanie, I can be a nurse attorney. I can be a nurse anesthesiologist. I can be so many things as a nurse, as you alluded to earlier. It's not just bedside care in the hospital, like we think of Florence Nightingale. There's so many avenues nurses can take, you can work part-time, full-time, only nights, only days. It's an amazing career. There's nothing. Absolutely nothing like it.

Host: Well, I agree with you. And as you say, it's expanding every single day. You can take that nursing career into any direction that you want. Schools, doesn't have to be in a hospital. You could be at schools, you could be at corporations. You could be, I mean, there's really no limit to where you can take your nursing and you can be a nurse anywhere in the world. I've always thought about that. Really, they need nurses all over the world, so it is a rewarding career. And I thank you, for joining us and really telling us about those rewards for people that are considering a career in nursing. And to see what nursing opportunities are available at Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital, please visit Henrymayo.com and click on the careers.

And that concludes this episode of It's Your Health Radio with Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital. For more health tips and updates follow us on your social channels. I'm Melanie Cole. Thanks so much for listening.