Let's Talk About the NICU's 50th Anniversary

Cami Smith:

Welcome to Centra Scripts. Here we talk about health, wellness, and practical tips for your everyday life. I'm your host, Cami Smith.

Hi, and welcome to Centra Scripts. My name is Cami Smith, and I am here with two wonderful nurses who are going to celebrate with me today. We're going to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. And so today I have with me Debbie and Brenda. And Brenda is actually a nurse practitioner, correct?

Brenda:

Correct.

Cami Smith:

Okay. A neonatal nurse practitioner.

Brenda:

Yes.

Cami Smith:

And then Debbie is a bedside nurse, registered nurse over in the intensive care unit. Correct?

Debbie:

Yes.

Cami Smith:

Okay. So I'm so excited that you guys have taken your time to come and share your story. I mean, I'm assuming you haven't been there for 50 years. Neither of you look old enough to be there for 50 years, but the time that you have spent there I'm sure has made such a huge impact on you. It's such a special place. So we'll start with Brenda. Can you just tell us a little bit about yourself, your position, what you do here at Centra?

Brenda:

Okay. My history with Centra and Virginia Baptist Hospital has been longstanding. Way back, I was actually born at Virginia Baptist Hospital and Dr. Peter Houck, who pioneered our unit and started it in October 2nd of 1972, was actually my private pediatrician as a child.

Cami Smith:

I love that so much.

Brenda:

So little did I know then that his work and efforts would influence my own career path. So I graduated from Lynchburg College, now called the University of Lynchburg and was employed by Centra in May of 1984. At that time there were no positions available in our intensive care nursery. So I was hired for coronary care unit at Virginia Baptist Hospital. I did speak directly with the CEO of Centra at that time, because I was very interested in having a position in the intensive care nursery and he promised me that if a position became available that they would transfer me.

Cami Smith:

Wow.

Brenda:

So he actually kept his promise and I was only two months into my orientation in July of 1984 that I was transferred to the intensive care nursery and I have been there ever since.

Cami Smith:

Okay. What was that like to step into this place you've wanted to work for so long, somewhere in a place where you were born? What was that like to start on that first day?

Brenda:

Scary. I knew I had only had one day of orientation as a nursing student in the intensive care nursery and I knew that it was a different field of medicine from any other field that existed and nothing that I got any training on or education with in school. But I just knew that I was better suited for the tiniest of patients. Adults were just too big for me. Coronary care unit was scarier than the intensive care nursery.

Cami Smith:

I can imagine. Okay. Debbie, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you came to work at Centra?

Debbie:

Well, I graduated in 1985 from the Lynchburg General Hospital School of Nursing, which is now Centra School of Nursing. And I thought I wanted to work with babies in the newborn nursery. I had no orientation to the intensive care nursery at all, so I didn't know much about that. But unlike Brenda, they had no positions available anywhere except for in the intensive care nursery. And so they asked if I would like to try the intensive care nursery and I've been there for 37 year

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