XXXX University is my first choice for graduate study online because of your Jesuit philosophy and tradition of placing those who most need our help as our highest priority. There is nothing I am as proud of as I am of working my six trips to Guatemala as a nurse, two weeks each time, accompanying doctors, dentists, and nurse practitioners. We went deep into the countryside, often sleeping on a concrete floor- It pleases me greatly that these were the best times of my life, and I cannot wait to return. Consistent with this objective and the overall mission of XXXX University to provide student-centered, excellent professional education in the Jesuit tradition, the School of Nursing & Health Studies has based its master's program curricula on terminal objectives derived from its mission and core values.
I stayed in very primitive accommodations with no hot water most of the time, only once, as our group slept for three nights in an abandoned school building. We slept on concrete floors on blankets. We had no showers and relied on baby wipes to clean ourselves. We used the bathroom, a hole in the ground surrounded by a cement wall with no door or the nearby cornfield.
My heart’s biggest desire is to continue working in the same department and spend some of my time off doing medical missions. I have worked in Interventional Radiology for the past two years, and I love that it offers such diversity in case types and patient populations. Some procedures are innovative medicine, like providing palliative treatments for hepatic carcinoma. We also rescue many ischemic strokes and embolization the hemorrhagic stroke.
There is a Nurse Practitioner in our department who has become my mentor. This is truly what I want my practice to be like. I love how his practice involves both inpatients and outpatients. He does consultations in the office. He sees inpatients daily on the floors and in the critical care unit. He also discharges post-procedural patients that have stayed overnight. I desire to do what he does and more. There has been some discussion about adding some duties to the NP in the area of Radiology Administration and about hiring another NP in the next year or two. I feel confident they will wait for me to graduate if I am in school. I already do minor procedures such as little organ biopsies, lumbar punctures, thoracentesis, and paracentesis.
I want to look back and know that I made a difference in my patients' lives ten years ago. Whether or not they remember my name is irrelevant. I hope they will remember that I educated them in managing their illness and healing their spirits through laughter, kindness, and a listening ear. I helped their loved ones cope with the disease and provided them with the tools needed to support their family members.
I was a Medical Assistant for ten years before becoming an RN, and I have read back over some thank you cards I received so many years ago. It is heartwarming to know that I made a difference for that patient at that moment.
Of additional note, I love that the hospital I work in is a major referral center for a 5-state area: AK, WA, OR, ID, and MT. There is diversity among the patients we serve: the inferior and the vibrant; the vast number of ethnicities, religions, and cultures; the urban Seattleite and those from remote areas of Alaska requiring air ambulance to get to us.