As manager of the neuro trauma intensive care unit (ICU) at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, Jackie Downing makes sure her team knows how much she appreciates them.
In weekly emails, she makes a point of sharing staff members’ random acts of kindness, like buying ice cream bars from the vending machine for everyone on shift. Or raising money for employees who might be experiencing hardships. Or simply having each other’s backs.
Downing, B.S.N, R.N., C.N.R.N., considers her team family. She tears up talking about how proud she is of them, and how they keep going no matter what.
The family has gotten a little bigger during COVID-19 as nurses and employees from other floors and units helped. True to form, Downing and her staff have opened their arms and hearts. In turn, the newcomers have taken on every task, every challenge, with determination and grace. This, despite a workload that went from three 12-hour shifts a week to four and sometimes five, and weathering a constant barrage of challenges to their own physical and mental well-being.
“I cannot imagine how hard it must be for staff to get pulled from their home units, their comfort zones, and asked to be hands-on in an unfamiliar environment — let alone a loud, busy ICU,” Downing said. “I wanted to find a meaningful way to show our appreciation.”
Downing initially sent thank-you notes to the nurses who stepped in. “You’re a blessing to our team,” she’d write. But there were just so many to thank, and so few spare minutes in which to put pen to paper.
Posters are awesome,” she said. “Candy is awesome. But we’d be drowning without these nurses. I collaborated with my team: What can we do?”
Amanda Abbas, R.N., looked on Pinterest and found acrylic puzzle pieces, each with a message of gratitude or inspiration. But they cost $150 for 10.
“I said I’d budget for them and reimburse her,” Downing said. “But she said, ‘No. We want to do this.’”
Abbas and her 5-year-old daughter, Maryam, bought puzzle piece molds and made the first batch together. Kimberly Gunn, B.S.N., R.N., CCRN – who has been at Texas Health Dallas for more than 40 years – and Jessica, her artistic, adult daughter, began making them, too. They came up with rhymes that, in just a few words, reflect the gratitude the whole unit feels:
Each time you choose to show up
You fill an empty space
And because you are a piece of it
This world’s a better place
“It’s just something cute to help keep the warm and fuzzies going,” Downing said, “and a special way to say thanks for making the tough days not so rough.”
Lindsey Green, R.N., was called up from cardiac ICU to work in Neuro Trauma ICU, where she had worked before.
“Jackie gave me the puzzle piece and made me feel I was part of the team,” Green said. “It was blue and sparkly, and after she gave it to me, I had a pretty good day after that.”
Someday, the pandemic will be in the team’s rearview mirror. Yet the puzzle pieces, and the caring they stand for, will remain.
“It isn’t much,” Abbas said, “but it will serve as a reminder that during the COVID pandemic, we were each a unique part of a puzzle that brought togetherness during a time we were all so distanced from the rest of the world.”
By Leslie Barker • Posted April 20, 2021
