Monday, September 22, 2008
i graduated from st elizabeth school of nursing in 1978 i worked at st e's for 15 years on nights i knew miss magee very well she was first and foremost a professional woman she genuinely cared about the patients and expected other nurses to do the same. it would seem that she was very rigid but new(and old) nurses need a role model to look up to.....this was miss magee. we used to have yearly Christmas parties for the night shift and she would let whoever was in charge of selling tickets if someone wanted to go but couldn't afford it to let her know and she would pay for them. as i said i was at st e's for 15yrs and i headed the Christmas party 6 times. each time she paid for up to 11 people to go out of her own pocket....what a lovely gift that went unspoken year after year. we also made little party favors....guess who paid for those? miss magee. i left nursing to go to medical school and on vacation breaks i came back and worked as a nurse to help save money. it was then when i was "floated" to any floor that needed me did i understand her role as supervisor neeeding to make sure everyone had the help they needed. she wasn't always popular with her choices. but being a staff nurse our vision was narrowed to what we needed on our unit. miss magee had to balance the needs of the entire hospital. i remember one particular night in intensive care that a doctor ordered a specific intravenous medication. it was potent and experimental. it had been used on my father and he died from the side effects. i told her i wouldn't give it unless it was opposed with another intravenous medication to control the side effects. my fellow co workers also refused. i told miss magee to give it herself. she was soooooooo angry with me...but she approached the doctor and explained my concerns...he ordered the other accompanying medication but the patient still died of it's side effects eeriely at the same minute of the time of my father's death. i sobbed and sobbed...it was like losing my father again except i had carried inside me...what if that other medication was given to my father...would he haved lived. that night with that patient i had my answer..he still would have died. it was 9:30am well past the time to go home and i still could not stop crying. miss magee called to check on me and came back after she was already home from work to put her arm around me while i cried. "sometimes God takes things out of our hands amy" she told me. i can feel that day as if it were yesterday. i wanted to tell those she leaves behind what an incredible person she was. she touched my life as a nurse and even now that i went on and became a doctor...my life is better because i knew her. God bless sincerely amy gorczynski RN MD
