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Tuesday, May 13
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 Pat Anderson |
The Perfect Guest
Originally published in Chicago Hospital News, May 2005
Pat Anderson, R.N., sees herself and her teammates as invited guests in a half-dozen nursing homes on the south side of Chicago, and conducts herself accordingly. She is happy to be there, she is diplomatic, she does everything she can to help, and when she leaves they urge her to hurry back.
As a nursing home nurse case manager for VITAS Innovative Hospice Care® of Chicagoland Central, Anderson’s clients are patients, families—and nursing homes. And in a city with lots of hospice competition, Anderson and her team stand out.
“If a VITAS patient becomes lethargic or is in a lot of pain, the nursing home L.P.N. has 32 patients,” Anderson points out. “She can’t stop to take care of one. But if I put the word out, the nursing home is amazed: I have an aide, a social worker, a chaplain, whatever I need. And continuous care? VITAS is one of the few hospices with our own continuous care nurses—one person at bedside 24/7. It’s very challenging, but it helps a nursing home so much.”
To say nothing of the patient. Anderson says it’s not unusual for a VITAS nurse or aide to be asked by the family of another patient, “How do I get that for my mom?”
“So we tell them about hospice, what I call our Hospice 101 discussion. We’ve grown so much because of our service, our reliability and our loving care,” she boasts. “Aides and nurses are VITAS’ best marketers.”
But more nursing homes demanded more Pat Andersons, because no nursing home wanted to lose her. So VITAS got creative. “We built a team of three nurses to manage eight or nine nursing homes, rather than give each nurse three of his or her own,” explains Doug Irvin, Chicagoland Central director of admissions. “So every facility still has Pat, and two of our nurses are learning directly from her.”
“I’m a mama bear,” Anderson says. “As a patient’s nurse you are their advocate, and especially today, advocating for dying people is important. A lot of people have very set ideas in their heads. We’re constantly teaching doctors and nursing homes, as well as family members, about hospice.”
Off the job, Anderson is Mama Bear to 300 marching teenagers. “You have to have something outside of death,” she says. “I’m very involved in my son and his band. I surround myself with young, lively, active people, and it makes me a better hospice nurse. Afterward, I’m ready to go back to the nursing homes.
“Because you can’t go in with an attitude. Why would they want us back?” she asks. “Why would they invite us back into their home? They invite VITAS back because they know they can count on us.”
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33131 (305) 374-4143 |
