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 St. John’s Hospital in Springfield, Missouri, is setting a high bar for Emergency Nurses Week celebrations.
First, the hospital is opening phase one of its new $20 million emergency trauma center to the public on October 11, during Emergency Nurses Week. The invitations to the opening event promote ENA’s Emergency Nurses Week theme of "a tradition of excellence." Banners promoting ENA and Emergency Nurses Week will welcome visitors to the new emergency care facility. Even though the hospital’s color is navy blue, the event’s committee members will be wearing lavendar polo shirts that are closer to ENA’s signature purple. "The theme is one of St. John’s working hand-in-hand with ENA," shared Mary Tuel, RN, CEN, staff nurse, and chief ENA promoter at St. John’s Hospital.
When visitors enter the triage area of the new emergency trauma center, they will be greeted by the executive staff of the hospital, and members of the Missouri ENA State Council and the local Ozark ENA Chapter. ENA 2004 President-Elect Patricia Kunz Howard, RN, PhD, CEN, also hopes to be in attendance. Visitors will tour the critical care area; the acute care center; and both the children’s and adult waiting and treatment rooms, which have been designed to soothe their respective patient populations. Enormous murals of underwater scenes and a large fish tank dominate the children’s waiting area, while huge glass windows allow buckets of warm sunshine to pour into the adult side.
Tuel has been working tirelessly with the hospital administration and ENA on the most spectacular element of the celebration: The gift of 75 ENA one-year memberships for the emergency trauma center staff. It is the largest group membership purchase in ENA’s history, confirmed Member Services Manager Judie Cruse. In recognition of its commitment, the hospital received five free memberships, plus two complimentary registrations for either the 2004 ENA Annual Meeting or the ENA Leadership Challenge 2005. The emergency trauma center staff plan to purchase a cappuccino maker and other goodies for their new break room with their ENA Member-Get-A-Member Campaign reward points.
The ENA group membership purchase - which applies to both full-time and part-time RNs - is being used as a retention and a recruitment tool, said Tuel. Nurses throughout the area, including upper Arkansas, have been invited to the celebration, which will end with an ENA meeting. Posters on easels located throughout the hallway will remind current and potential staff of the features of the emergency trauma center, including that it is the number one care facility in the area for cardiac emergencies; stroke prevention; and pediatrics. "A lot of the nurses who are here have never worked at other places, so they may not recognize what a nice place this is," Tuel commented. "We have a little bit of a nursing shortage, but not as bad as others. We are the big dogs. We have the only burn center in the area; yesterday we got four really bad burns from North Arkansas, and we absorbed that."
Tuel pointed out that the group membership purchase could not have happened without the enthusiastic support of Emergency Trauma Center Director Connie Donovan, RN. When Donovan was moving into her position last year, she discovered some monies that had been set aside for the emergency nursing staff. "She came to me and said. ‘How can we best help our nurses?’" Tuel shared. "She knows I’m a big ENA proponent, so she suggested the memberships, and I said, ‘Yes! Because they will all get so many benefits when they become members."
Part of the focus of the opening celebration is to encourage the emergency trauma center staff to get involved in ENA. Tuel said the Ozark Chapter holds several injury prevention activities throughout the year, including a statewide "Battle of the Belt" to promote seat belt use. One of the biggest goals of the membership gift is to challenge the staff to become Certified Emergency Nurses (CEN®s) by the end of 2005, she said. The Missouri ENA State Council has put together a touring CEN review course that it will take on the road next year, including a stop at St. John’s.
The staff will officially move into their new space in December, and the second phase of the emergency trauma center construction is set to begin in 2006 or 2007.
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