Providing health care at a community hospital is often a tough, demanding job that comes with high expectations and high pressure. It requires people who are well trained, highly confident and deeply motivated and who work well in a team-oriented environment.  There is another place that could be described similarly – a military unit. 

So it’s no surprise that people who find reward and success in the hospital setting also flourish in the military. And it’s also why Iowa hospitals wholeheartedly support their employees who have made that commitment to serve. 

One of those employees is Carrie Riley, a nurse at Winneshiek Medical Center in Decorah.  Like many medical professionals who have joined the military, Riley wanted to support those on the front lines who put their bodies and lives harm’s way every day.  “When I joined, the war had been going for a while. This just seemed like a way I could use my own skills to take care of them (injured soldiers),” she recently explained to the local newspaper, the Decorah Public Opinion. 

But unlike most others, Riley is twice as old as the soldiers she treats.  At age 45, those soldiers are like her own children, who are in their early and mid-20s.  “I think this is a remarkable feat for a woman in her early 40s to opt to join the military, let alone serve in a war zone,” said Riley’s husband, Bruce, who is also a military veteran. 

Riley’s war-zone deployment began in early August when her unit, the 109^th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron of the Minnesota Air National Guard, went overseas with the mission of stabilizing and caring for wounded soldiers who are being flown out of Afghanistan and Iraq to military hospitals in Europe.  The transports, which use Air Force cargo planes that have been converted into massive high-tech air ambulances, typically take nine hours each way. 

“It’s a fluid environment. You’re moving constantly. We have a place to stay, but you carry enough stuff with you to last a couple of weeks,” she explained. 

Riley said she is thrilled to be part of the military effort and is inspired by those she cares for.  “They have these awful injuries, yet they have the best attitudes. It’s amazing really, but it’s also why it’s so great to take care of them,” she said. “I just want to contribute to helping the troops. No matter how you feel about the war, people are over there still getting hurt and injured.” 

The experience is also made positive by the support she gets from her employer, Winneshiek Medical Center.  “The staff has been awesome. I’ve been doing this for three years and they’ve been really supportive. I’ve been gone three or four weeks at a time and my coworkers have covered for me.” 

“Carrie is an inspiration of service to her colleagues and peers at Winneshiek Medical Center as well as to myself,” said Dan Wener, the hospital’s CEO.  “She is using her expertise and compassion to benefit our soldiers, while placing herself in harm’s way.  Carrie’s love of country is evident in her actions, I am proud someone of such character is part of Winneshiek Medical Center.”

In recognition of National Nurses Week, IHA is taking an in-depth look at one of the many career tracks possible within the field of nursing.

Julie Larson is a nurse practitioner at Hancock County Memorial Hospital in Britt.  Julie was kind enough to take a few moments out of her very busy schedule to sit down with us and answer a few questions about her career and what advice she can provide to those who may be interested in pursuing this as his or her own nursing career.

YouTube link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmYBxOVo4oc

National Nurses Day is held on May 6 as part of National Nurse Week that ends on May 12, coinciding with Florence Nightingale’s birthday.

National Nurses Day has been in existence since 1965 with its inception by the International Council on Nurses as a day of recognition for some of the health care system’s finest and most dedicated and caring staff members.

Recognizing the dedication and commitment of Iowa nurses, the 6^th Annual “100 Great Iowa Nurses” event was recently held at the Iowa Events Center, showcasing 100 of the best nurses as nominated and selected by their peers from across the state.  Not surprisingly, the vast majority of these nurses work at Iowa’s community hospitals.

We all know a great nurse and today everyone should take the time to thank them for their hard work, dedication and commitment to the patients they serve.  Iowa nurses provide care to patients around the clock in the best and worst of times.  National Nurses Week provides the opportunity to give back by simply saying, “Thank You.”

Here are a few Web sites that offer free, electronic Nurse Day cards to send:

• 123 Greetings
• Blue Mountain
  

It takes a lot to shake up an emergency room (ER) nurse.  But for Ronda Johnson, who works at Trinity Bettendorf’s ER and volunteered to go to Haiti shortly after that country’s devastating January earthquake, the concept of “trauma” will never be the same.

“You can’t go somewhere like this and not have it change you,” said Johnson, who has been in nursing for 18 years.  “CNN and all of the other images you see on TV don’t do it justice.  They don’t even come close.”

Johnson traveled with fellow Trinity Bettendorf ER nurse Catherine Jones to Port-au-Prince in the weeks following the catastrophic 7.0 earthquake that devastated Haiti on January 12.  Johnson and Jones were two of 12 from across the country who provided aid as part of a group coordinated by international relief organization Project Helping Hands.  Johnson had heard the group’s founder, Jeff Solheim, speak at a medical conference a few years ago and was impressed with their outreach efforts in third world countries.

“I contacted him afterward and told him, ‘If you ever need help, let me know if you have a need greater than the response,’” Johnson said.  “Immediately following the earthquake there was an urgent call put out; the need was that great.”

That’s an understatement.  After paying their own way to the impoverished island and bringing only the medical supplies they could carry with them, the nurses were inserted into an area with an 80 percent mortality rate.

While there, they witnessed lines of people waiting for hours in the sweltering heat for food and care.  They encountered survivors with tuberculosis begging for a job because their starving family needed food more than they needed medical attention.  And they were overcome by the smell of 60 decaying infant bodies, crushed in the rubble near an orphanage.

Johnson shares more details in a series of video interviews posted by the hospital.