Nurses Honored for Extraordinary Efforts

They braved floodwaters to rescue dozens of nursing home residents; crawled under and into mangled vehicles to save those inside; ignored blood, mud, and freezing cold temperatures to administer CPR; even rushed in to rescue survivors of terrorist attacks or hurricanes.

These nurses are among the 10 recognized as Nurse Heroes this year by Nursing Spectrum, NurseWeek, and Gannett Healthcare Group, as well as our cosponsors, The Johnson & Johnson Campaign for Nursing's Future and Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing.

"These nurses showed initiative, leadership, and clinical competence in extraordinarily difficult circumstances," says Steve Hauber, CEO and publisher of Gannett Healthcare Group, parent company of Nursing Spectrum and NurseWeek. "By honoring their accomplishments, we bring attention to the scope and skills of professional nursing as it's practiced every day."

The winners were selected from a pool of many worthy nurses nominated by peers and patients for their efforts to save lives outside the workplace and under adverse circumstances between May 2004 and May 2007. In November, each recipient was honored at Sigma Theta Tau's 39th biennial convention in Baltimore, Md.

"Nurses respond to these types of disasters, and many others, every day of every year," says Cynthia Vlasich, RN, BSN, vice president of Gannett Healthcare Group. "We need to take pride in what we do every day, and we need the heroes from our profession to lead the way."

Here are their stories.

Janet S. Rami, RN, PhD

Janet S. Rami, RN, PhD, made it her goal to not only provide health care to those who needed it after Hurricane Katrina hit but also to ensure ongoing quality care.

The dean at the school of nursing at Southern University, Baton Rouge, La., worked tirelessly from Aug. 31, 2005, to May 31, 2007, to provide primary healthcare services to Hurricane Katrina evacuees. Rami led the mobilization of advanced practice nurses, nursing faculty, and student and physician volunteers. As shelters around the city began to close in September 2005, Rami made plans to adopt Renaissance Village, the largest FEMA transitional trailer community in the city. She arranged for the school of nursing to coordinate care, so everyone caring for people in the village would be credentialed and care would be efficient.

She says the experience made clear the power of nursing. "The idea that a nursing school could actually go into a FEMA village of 1,500 people ... and they would allow us to independently control all their health care in their village — that's the most amazing thing when I look at it. But we did it," Rami says.

Lynne Burns, RN

When the passenger van ahead of her went off the road, smashed into a tree, and overturned, Lynne Burns, RN, pulled over to help. Unable to open the van's doors, Burns ignored the smoke and a stream of fluid she suspected was fuel and crawled through the broken windshield, searching for the most severely injured of the 15 terrified, bloody victims.

"I don't think I could have turned back, but I did wish I had gloves," she says. Burns extricated and cared for two men in critical condition, who had suffered closed head injuries and collapsed lungs, and remained on the scene until everyone inside the van had been transported to hospitals. "Even with all the ambulances there, we could have used 20 more hands," she says.

Burns called her supervisor at the North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System hospital in Syosset, N.Y., to say she'd been delayed, and went to work after showering and changing her uniform.

Three days later, Burns received a letter from a first responder. "In the midst of all the chaos, I saw you, a nurse, giving care to a patient," wrote Steven Bernstein, EMT CC. "You didn't have to stop, but you did. Just seeing you there was a 'home run' for all of us ... [I] had a touch more confidence in my job just knowing that you were there."

Ursula Goodine, RN

Birdwatcher Ursula Goodine, RN, was in the country when she saw Kerri Hatch lying facedown on the road, moments after falling from a horse. "It was very ominous," says Goodine, who was an OR nurse at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston until retiring recently. "She was bleeding profusely from her ear, nose, and mouth. I was afraid she had a brain injury and, because of her head position, a possible c-spine fracture. Then she arrested."

Bystanders helped Goodine turn Kerri. She started chest compressions, and Kerri's mother, Audrey Hatch, began ventilation. "We continued CPR for 20 minutes," recalls Audrey. "At one point, I remember saying, 'It is no use; she is gone.' [Goodine] said, most firmly, 'Continue! You never give up.' "

Audrey marvels at how "Ursula gave of herself, totally, without reservation, to save a life," touching Kerri's blood regardless of risk. Goodine marvels, too, especially at Kerri's "amazing progress" today.

"By chance, we happened to be at that place at that moment with someone whose life was essentially gone," she says.

Paul David Meek, RN, BSN, BEd, CEN, CLNC

Floodwaters rose to dangerous levels Oct. 2, 2005, putting search-and-rescue volunteer Paul David Meek, RN, BSN, BEd, CEN, CLNC, in a precarious position. The trauma specialist and ED nurse at Stormont-Vail Regional Medical Center, Topeka, Kan., had never done a water rescue.

Still, Meek and his search-and-rescue team colleagues rescued 75 people — including 56 from a local nursing home. Miraculously, no lives were lost or serious injuries sustained.

Meek and his team worked a harrowing 17 hours to rescue adults and children from the raging waters. He says his scariest moment was holding an infant above the water as the baby's family climbed into the rescue boat.

"[The nurse in me thought], there's no way I'm going to let go of that baby until it is back in the mother's arms," Meek says. "Sometimes when things happen, nurses are people who keep calm, look at the situation, and take care of the people — no matter how insurmountable it may seem."

Ruth Rucker, RN

Just eight months after implementing nursing services at Hands of Hope Clinic, the only provider of free medical and dental care in Henry County, Georgia, volunteer clinical director Ruth Rucker, RN, was asked to extend services to Hurricane Katrina evacuees — 18,000 of them.

In fewer than 24 hours, Rucker assembled teams of volunteer nurses and physicians, medical equipment, supplies, and funds for medications. Rucker supervised her staff onsite (in Stockbridge, Ga.) more than 12 hours daily for seven days. The volunteers ultimately served 1,600 patients with pregnancy-related, cardiac, diabetic, and other acute and chronic problems, as well as those with disaster-related psychological trauma, infection, and injuries.

"Nurses are great assessors and planners," she says. "When something so big happens, you want to be part of it ... you jump in and do what needs to be done."

LaVonne L. Lewis, RN, PhD

A massive snowstorm and treacherous, icy roads in Pine Mountain, Calif., didn't stop LaVonne L. Lewis, RN, PhD, from helping a man who had been thrown from his car after an accident. Neither did the tremendous pain she experienced as a result of Reynaud's disease, a condition of the hands and feet that worsens in cold temperatures.

Lewis provided emergency first aid and kept him stabilized as they waited 45 minutes for an ambulance to arrive.

A trained psychologist and experienced nurse, Lewis had volunteered for a decade with the local fire department in Pine Mountain, an area filled with steep canyon roads. But all she could do that day, she says, was to tell the driver jokes to keep up his blood pressure and help him stay conscious.

"I function well in emergencies, and I know it's because of my belief in God," she says. "I've always had the philosophy that you cure sometimes, you heal often, and comfort always."

Shonna Robison, RN

Moments after a car sped by, Shonna Robison, RN, a licensed paramedic, watched as it crashed head-on into another car and both vehicles caught fire. After ensuring the driver of the other car was safe, Robison searched the wreckage.

"There was nothing to climb into," says Robison, who was then the ER director at Hopkins County Memorial Hospital in Sulphur Springs, Texas. "I shimmied under what was crushed into the ground."

Both the driver and front-seat passenger were dead, and neither she nor arriving rescuers saw a baby, but Robinson thought she had seen an infant seat through the rear window as the car sped by. Ignoring their pleas to clear the scene, Robison felt her way through the debris until she reached a tiny body and pulled it out.

Moments later, the wreckage collapsed. By then, Robison was starting IVs and splinting the baby’s fractured limbs. “I was so blessed to do it,” she says. “Life and death are totally different when you’re not in uniform.”

Barbara Chamberlain, RN, DNSc

Barbara Chamberlain, RN, DNSc, was volunteering to build rail fences at Gettysburg (Pa.) National Battlefield Park when a fellow volunteer, 76-year-old Bruce Pince, became faint, lost consciousness and suffered a heart attack.

Chamberlain, corporate director of clinical education and research for Kennedy Health System, Cherry Hill, N.J., immediately went into nurse mode. In cold, hard rain and standing in ankle-deep mud, she began CPR while recruiting others, including park rangers, to help. Because of poor weather conditions, park rangers decided not to use their equipment to restart Pince’s heart, and the local EMS crew was delayed. So Chamberlain and her team continued CPR for about 14 minutes until help arrived.

They saved Pince’s life. “I learned that I have a strong head, a good heart and can hold my own in an emergency situation,” Chamberlain says.

Capt. Betty Clavijo Bennett, RN, PhD(c), CCRN, CEN

Betty Clavijo Bennett, RN, PhD(c), CCRN, CEN, was the house supervisor at Baptist Hospital in New Orleans, preparing, watching and waiting for Hurricane Katrina to hit New Orleans. That was Sunday, Aug. 28, 2005. By the following Tuesday night, flooding from downed levees forced the evacuation of more than 2,000 people in the hospital, including some 200 patients, staff and families.

Bennett took charge of the air evacuation efforts on the hospital’s 11th story. An Air Force critical care nurse and hospital ICU nurse, Bennett drew on her military and nursing know-how. She managed — without modern communication systems — to coordinate patient evacuations with helicopter pilots, throughout the brutal heat of the days and lightless, dangerous nights. With gunfire from local gangs right outside the hospital walls, Bennett and her team worked round the clock for more than four days.

“It wasn’t just my ICU nursing or my 33 years of all different specialties of nursing or just my Air Force nursing that bailed me out,” Bennett says. “It was the combination of all the mentors through the years,” Bennett says. “We just flat out wouldn’t give up.”

Lisa Levine, RN

Lisa Levine, RN, was on the London subway on July 7, 2005, when terrorists attacked. The train car next to the one she was in was bombed. Her car derailed and filled instantly with smoke.

Levine, who was uninjured, didn’t think twice before trying to help those screaming in nearby cars. She jumped through a broken window to begin triage and assessments. She instructed those who were feeling faint to lie down and moved those with broken bones out of harm’s way.

Hailed as an “American hero” by local and international media, Levine, a Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based senior implementation consultant for Quadramed Corporation, which provides IT solutions for health care organizations, says she wishes she could have done more that fateful day.