2021 AWARD WINNERS

Deborah M. Green

Deborah is a hands-on nurse, consistently holding her team accountable and making sure they serve with integrity and meet the needs of their patients. She is responsible for managing three disease-specific certification programs through The Joint Commission, which include Total Hip Replacement, Total Knee Replacement, and Hip Fracture. Deborah is always looking for new ways to serve her patients and collaborates regularly with the surgeons, makes follow-up phone calls, and reviews education with nursing staff. Deborah is truly a role model for Swanson’s Theory of Caring.

INTEGRITY

She is responsible for managing three disease –specific certifications. Part of this role is to complete manual chart reviews to ensure compliance with performance measures, such as every-four-hour neurovascular checks and post-operative day zero mobilization by midnight. While most would just complete the audits, this nurse goes above and beyond. This nurses comes in every morning at 0545 to meet with night shift to validate performance measures were met. She reviews the charts with the nurses to improve accountability. Additionally, she meets with all new employees within their first 30 days of work to review our program and train nurses on the appropriate way to document to ensure it reflects the work they are doing.

EXCELLENCE

This nurse strives to excel in all that she does. She is currently certified in her area of expertise and attends several orthopedic conferences each year. She is also a Clinical Nurse III, Lead Charge Nurse, Primary Preceptor, and facilitates many unit work groups and councils. This nurse is responsible for educating all of the total hip replacement and total knee replacement patients prior to surgery. She conducts three in-person classes each month to approximately 125 patients and their loved ones. She sends each patient an individual invite to the class, creates the presentation, meets with patients after the class, and rounds on patients after surgery. This year, she added a late night class to meet the needs of patients who are still working, to decrease the amount of time they have to take off of work before their surgery, which was a huge satisfier.

INNOVATION

This nurse consistently seeks opportunities to improve the care we provide to our patients. She often brings back new knowledge from conferences to review with providers to determine if we should change our practice. This nurse volunteered to identify clinical practice guidelines to guide our practice for our patient populations. She then presented this information to our surgical/medical providers at the monthly meetings she facilitates. After approval, she added the guidelines to our intranet, educated nursing staff, and made changes to current practice. This nurse is currently working on a new model to assist total joint replacements in going home the same day of surgery. This takes a village! Yet, this nurse knows it is what is best for the patient and is willing to do the work. She collaborates with the surgeons, makes follow-up phone calls, reviews education with nursing staff, and collaborates with the therapy department.

COLLABORATION

This nurse is a Unit Champion for the Enhanced Recovery After Surgery (ERAS) program, requiring her to collaborate with many departments, including anesthesia, post-operative care unit, block, hospitalist co-management team. In this role, she is responsible for ensuring post-operative orders support a multi-modal pain management pathway that is conducive to early ambulation, while decreasing the use of opioids; and she audits several performance measures for review during daily safety huddles. This nurse is an integral part of collaboration at every level. She developed an ingenious way to streamline the discharge process on our unit. On average, our unit admits and discharges 25 patients in 12 hours! This nurse created a board for nursing, providers, case managers, occupational therapy, physical therapy, and the durable medical equipment personnel to communicate when patients were cleared for discharge.

CARING

Above all else, this nurse is a caring nurse. Swanson’s theory of caring can be seen in every interaction this nurse has with not only patients, but also fellow team members. Her commitment to developing the education program validates “knowing” what her patients need. After surgery she is “being with” her patients when she rounds on them to make sure they are walking by midnight or their pain medications are appropriate. She is “doing for” them when she creates their discharge plan and communicates their individualized needs to the appropriate individuals. She “enables” them when she assists them to the car at discharge. Lastly, she “maintains belief” by following through on her commitments to her patients and checking on them after discharge.

IMPACT STATEMENT

This nurse is the current Mother of Nursing on our unit and is our WHY…we are successful; a team; passionate; caring; committed; DUKE NURSES!

Deborah Green

Deborah M. Green

RN, OCN

Clinical Nurse III
Orthopaedic/Neurosurgery Unit 7-1
Duke Regional Hospital

Award:

Duke Regional Hospital Medical Staff Award for Excellence in Nursing Practice
SPONSORS
Duke regional hospital logo
Congratulations to Duke Regional Hospital’s 2021 Friends of Nursing Excellence Award Winners
duke Neurosciences and Behavioral Health combined logo
The Duke Neurosciences Service Line and The Duke Behavioral Health Services Line Congratulate our 2021 Friends of Nursing Nominees and Award Winners

DNP, NP-C, AACC, FAANP

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Friends of Nursing Gala 2021

Friends of Nursing Gala 2021

Friends of Nursing Gala 2021