Shalof's attempts to advocate for the patient to a resident and the patient's son were unsuccessful the son suggested she was the "Angel of Death." She tells the story of one aged patient with multi system failure whose son would not let her go, insisting on heroic measures which in all likelihood caused the patient needless suffering. She touches on the difficulties associated with the restructuring of the 1990's, which led to cutbacks and nurse layoffs, and the 2003 SARS crisis, which threatened and burdened nurses far more than any other class of health care workers. The author also offers insights born of experience with some of the toughest health issues society confronts.
This short passage is an excellent antidote to the usual mass media depiction of codes, in which only the work of physicians is of any consequence.
In briefly describing a code, she clearly shows the critical tasks that four nurses and a physician performed to bring the patient back to life. Shalof also frankly explains her struggles to handle the pressure, responsibility and strenuous nature of the ICU. On one of Shalof's first days at a general medical ward in the 1980's, a senior nurse who saw her floundering with an array of tasks she had only read about mocked her for being a "university grad," saying the unit needed some "real nurses." We're trying to imagine such a sad, self-loathing comment coming out of the mouth of a senior physician or lawyer. She describes how she gradually gained the confidence and expertise to be part of what she calls the "elite squad" of nurses staffing a major hospital's ICU, offering a number of telling insights and anecdotes along the way. The excerpt traces Shalof's career trajectory from her Cherry Ames-inspired dreams of becoming "one of those compassionate, generous people who did generous things" to her current status as an ICU veteran. The excerpt gives the magazine's many readers an honest and thoughtful look at the development of a nurse and some of the key aspects of bedside practice, despite occasional lapses into unhelpful angel imagery.
March 2005 - This month's issue of Reader's Digest (Canada) included as a "Book Choice" an engaging excerpt from Tilda Shalof's A Nurse's Story (2004), which describes the nurse's years working in a Toronto hospital ICU. Reader's Digest: "Life, Death & in Between - A Nurse's Story" For foundations and health policy makers.Publicize efforts to improve nurses' working conditions.
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