The DAISY Award was created to honor the super-human work nurses do for patients and families every day. The Toledo Hospital NICU is full of nurses who embody the spirit of the DAISY Award. We are incredibly grateful for each one of them and the time they spent caring for our daughter in such a trying and stressful time. With that being said, we feel compelled to nominate this individual for their expertise, outstanding work, and compassion towards our family. Amanda Huffman went above and beyond the incredible standards and expectations set by the NICU team. She was with us from the very beginning of our daughter’s NICU stay until her discharge 54 days later. During our daughter’s first week at Toledo Hospital, we were lucky to have Amanda as our nurse for several nights. As we navigated an incredibly stressful and uncertain time, she was there with patience, compassion, and confidence to help us as much as she helped our daughter. When possible, she encouraged and taught us, as parents, how to participate in the care of our daughter, which helped us gain the confidence to be as involved as possible. She gave us the strength and courage to look beyond the cords and tubes attached to our daughter and provided opportunities for us to bond with our daughter. After our first week at the hospital, we found out we could request primary nurses and did not hesitate to request Amanda. We would often stay late, not wanting to be away from our daughter for a moment. Her professionalism, nursing expertise, and compassion gave us the confidence to try to have a semblance of a “normal” routine outside of the NICU, knowing our daughter was in caring hands.
As our time continued in the NICU, our bond with Amanda also strengthened and extended to our parents. She would happily explain situations, alleviate concerns, and connect with all of us beyond the basic patient-nurse relationship. As first-time parents, Amanda was there to celebrate many firsts with us, and we are incredibly thankful she was there to share the joys of those moments with us. If there was ever a time when their incredible skillset was needed for another child, and she was not assigned to us for their shift, she would still check in to see how our daughter was doing and if we needed anything. Amanda was an advocate for our daughter, and because of the extensive time she spent with her, she was often able to identify issues before they became greater concerns. One main barrier that our daughter faced, as a premie, was her inability to safely take a bottle. For weeks, we worked to feed our daughter safely. But she kept having alarms and drops in her blood pressure from choking. The primary individuals who could routinely avoid an alarm were us, as parents, and Amanda because we knew her cues. She helped identify that our daughter was silent refluxing when bottle-feeding breast milk because it was so thin. She consulted with the speech therapist to recommend a solution, which was the key to getting our daughter to safely take a bottle, resulting in her being discharged from the NICU earlier than we anticipated. Thankfully, Amanda was there on our last day in the NICU so we could say a proper goodbye to her.
We still maintain a friendship with Amanda and share updates on our daughter with her. She is still as caring and genuine as she was when caring for our daughter. We look forward to telling our daughter all about her journey and the courageous nurse who cared for her! When we tell friends, family, and even strangers our story, we always praise the Toledo Hospital staff and Amanda's profound impact on us. We do not wish the circumstances that led us to meet her and need her incredible skills on anyone. Still, we cannot express enough the positive experience Amandna and the Toledo NICU fostered for us. While we were still at the NICU, we were made aware of the DAISY Award and knew immediately that Amanda deserved it. She is driven by excellence and committed to exceptional experiences; she helped advance our daughter’s health and has changed our lives. Outside of this award, the strongest praise we can continue to give them and the Toledo Hospital staff is recommending anyone we know who is expecting a child, to deliver at Toledo Hospital.