Hancock Health Nurses: Thoughts from Craig Felty

He skips his lunch to make sure a diabetic patient eats, so her sugar levels don’t drop.

She stays after the office closes so she can discuss a new diagnosis with an elderly patient’s family.

She comforts a newly diagnosed cancer patient and stays with them until family arrives.

These aren’t the typical things our community might think about when it comes to nurses. But these are just a few of the things Hancock Health nurses have done while taking care of patients. Comprised of Nurses in Hancock Physician Network and Nurses at Hancock Regional Hospital, we are one family of healers… We are Hancock Health Nurses!

Nurses here truly heal.

While there are dozens of professional roles that touch patient care in a hospital, the most intimate and significant is nursing. Every person who has ever been, or had a family member, in the hospital knows the difference a caring nurse can make. They are the unwavering guardians of patient healing, care, and safety.

This year, we celebrate National Nurses Week May 6-12 with the Theme “4 Million Reasons to Celebrate” to honor and thank the nearly 4-Million Nurses in America.

At Hancock Health, nurses have long played an important role in creating a culture of safety. With a program called “hourly rounding,” they make sure patients have all they need so they are less likely to get up and fall. With a service called “bedside shift report,” they share information about patients during shift change right at the bedside, so the patient can be involved in their own care. Nurses embrace continuous and often rigorous training to make sure they are delivering care per the latest best practices. They embrace technology that seems to change daily, all in the name of safety. Delivering nursing care is intense work, but it is beloved by nurses at Hancock Health.

While keeping safety and healing at the top of their minds, nurses here never forget that caring is their calling. A simple walk through the halls of a Nursing Unit will prove that.

Nearly 300 Hancock Health Nurses have been caring nurses for between 0 and 44 years. They care for their friends and neighbors, they raise their children in our schools, they drive aging parents to appointments with our physicians, and they retire with a few tears and the fondness and esteem of their colleagues.

Hancock Health is committed to developing the next generation of nurses by actively recruiting new graduates, and rotating dozens of students through clinical training each quarter. Innovative programs like the Nurse Extern Program are giving our local nursing students the chance to deliver care right here at home, in the communities they love and want to see thrive.

Nursing, as a profession, changes every single day. Nurses at Hancock Health answer the call. They are pioneers, paving the way for meaningful, measurable, and lasting change in how health care is delivered. To that end, I offer my humble and sincere gratitude to every single Nurse in our organization and the hope of a well-deserved happy Nurses Week 2019.

You are appreciated!!!