LTJG Alison Park and CAPT Grau
May 2013
Alison
Park
,
RN, BSN
Labor and Delivery
Naval Medical Center San Diego
San Diego
,
CA
United States

 

 

 

I would like to nominate LTJG Park for her outstanding care of a recent patient on Labor & Delivery, NMCSD.

The patient was admitted to be induced with medical indication of hypertension. It was she & her husband's first child. It took a full 12 hours for the patient to even reach a threshold of labor, as she underwent various methods of induction. 24 hours after being admitted, the patient was still in the 1st stage of labor making very slow progress, extremely fatigued and discouraged by that point, though remaining healthy and fit to continue with a natural childbirth. After caring for this patient throughout the patient's admission shift, LTJG Park requested to be assigned to her on her second shift the following evening and took on what might be considered by other's an arduous or pointless challenge, due to the patient's slow labor progress and therefore probable need to resort to cesarean delivery.

LTJG Park utilized all of her nursing capability from encouragement of the patient to keep her hopeful & motivated, to maximizing mobility, position changes, & pain control tools, all with the goal of helping the patient reach her goal of a safe, natural childbirth.

She stayed committed to the patient's desires for her birth while helping her to understand her physical needs & labor process, an often difficult balance for nurses to find with their patients. She collaborated with the resident physician team, and advocated for the patients progress and fitness to continue labor. I have no doubt that if it weren't for tenacious, creative, & vigilant nursing management this patent would not have the excellent outcome she did.

After 30 hours on the unit, a third of which was in active labor, this patient delivered a healthy baby girl, free of complications. LTJG Park demonstrated, in this case, as she has in so many others, nursing commitment that defined the outcome of one patient's labor, and the start of another's life.