Nursing Awards 2020
May 7, 2020NURSING PRACTICE AWARD
The Nursing Practice Award recognizes a nurse involved in direct patient care. The recipient is recognized by peers as one who contributes to the advancement of nursing practice and demonstrates strength of character, commitment and competence.
NSG Practice – Nanette Santaro, LPN, PCC West
Words from the written nominations:
Nanette is one of the most kindest individuals who exemplifies what it means to live the mission, vision, and values of St. Joseph's Health. Nan is always kind, caring, compassionate, and leads by example. She is a mentor to other employees and students and her positive way about her will make anyone having a bad day suddenly realize they are having a good one. She has been a pediatric nurse for St. Joseph's Health only for 37 years on June 28. 2020. She has dedicated many hours of service exhibiting her commitment to service. She is a role model to her peers and her patients are blessed to have such an amazing nurse touch theirs lives. There are many patients who are now adults with children that remember the times as child Nan was there nurse and smiles are endless with the pleasant stories of how she cared for them. Nanette Santoro more than deserves the honor of the Nursing Practice Award and it is a true honor to work with a woman of her caliber.
Nan is hard working, caring and considerate. She will do anything for anyone and exemplifies at the highest accord nursing practice. She is a team player and collaborates as needed to reach clinic and organizational need. She is well respected and loved by her colleagues for all these reasons and more.
NURSING LEADERSHIP AWARD
The Nursing Leadership Award recognizes a nurse leader who demonstrates exceptional leadership, guidance and service to St. Joseph’s Health as well as to the profession of nursing.
NSG Leader – Jen Van Dyke, RN Manager, CPEP
From the written nominations:
Jennifer a selfless human, nurse, manager, colleague who demonstrates a safe, fair, conscientious but yet upbeat and fun work environment. Jen takes on each task with leadership, confidence and we can do this team approach. Especially with this ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Jennifer demonstrate leadership by providing staff with information on the virus. Being available to answer questions and concerns of staff as it relates to the virus. She continues to be present and available to staff.
Jennifer Vandyke is one of the kindest and most generous of humans. She demonstrates this in her work and off the clock with her involvement in mentoring within her church, the foreign exchange student program and more. As a manager, these qualities translate into descriptions like fair, compassionate, selfless, tireless, and generous. Jennifer sees the best in everyone: staff and patients alike advocating for them and making time to listen. She speaks to EVERYONE EVERY TIME with the same level of respect and kindness.
Jennifer strives to meet the individual and unique needs of the patients and families we serve in CPEP by facilitating staff and community collaboration. Now in my 20th year of nursing, I have never worked with or for someone who gives so much of themselves to the organization and the principles it upholds. What a true leader Jennifer Vandyke is. Thank You!
NURSING EDUCATION AWARD
The Nursing Education Award recognizes a nurse who mentors and teaches nursing practice excellence and collaboration.
NSG Educator – Katie Lamay
From the written nominations:
Katie was instrumental in coordinating the COVID-19 education response for our Ministry. While the entire Ed Svcs team flexed incredibly to support the high demands for specific COVID education content via different platforms and modalities of learning, Katie lived all our values and worked to coordinate the creation of new education content; aided in the development of abridged content reviews to re-competency former clinicians working in administrative, leadership, and other roles; and she helped work on the new transition plan to recruit clinical colleagues back into frontline service. Katie took the reigns and ensured collaborative, 24/7 Ed Svcs coverage would be available to support all SJH colleagues and patients, and her approach to assisting in supporting her own colleague-peers has been phenomenal.
Katie is a Nurse, an Educator and a Transformational Leader. She demonstrates excellence in nursing practice, she motivates others to advance their thinking, practice and education and she leads by example.
In addition to the work (traveled to Michigan to support TogetherCare) Katie did this year, she also lives the mission, vision and values of St. Joseph's in everything that she does. She is inspirational! As a colleague, I am grateful to work side-by-side with Katie. Thank you for being you Katie!
CLINICAL COLLABORATION AWARD
The Clinical Collaboration Award recognizes a professional involved in patient care who is recognized by peers as one who contributes to the advancement of their profession and demonstrates strength of character, commitment and competence.
Clin Collaborator – Nicole Young, PM&R
From the written nominations:
St. Joseph's and the PM&R department are lucky to have Nikki as a team member. She is a natural leader and as UPC Chair, she took quickly to the responsibility of leading Tiered Huddles. As she reports out the department metrics and discusses projects to improve our care, she keeps an upbeat and positive attitude of how to help others- both patients and colleagues. Nikki is organized and prepared each morning for huddle and to start her day of patient care. She encourages all of her PM&R teammates to work together on projects and come to solutions collaboratively. Nikki began her professional career at St. Joseph's, following in her mother's footsteps. As a new graduate, Nikki showed great skill as a Physical Therapist while living our mission. Her compassion towards her patients has always been evident. Over the years that
Nikki has worked at St. Joseph's, she has worked in all care settings including ICU, med-surg and specialties such as cardiac and orthopedics. No matter what area Nikki works in, she builds a great relationship with the nursing staff and earns their trust and respect. She consistently attends SNAP huddles and offers suggestions to help the whole care team to progress the patient. Because Nikki has spent time in so many areas of the hospital, she is able to show up on any unit and fit in seamlessly. She will even often start her day out in one area and then pick up patients to help her co-workers in other areas without skipping a beat. Her adaptability and willingness to collaborate with the multi-disciplinary and PM&R team makes her a perfect candidate for this award and a valuable team member.