Stacey Mislavsky, Occupational Therapist, VNSNY Home Care

“It’s incredibly meaningful to me that I get to go into people’s homes and help them restore their function so that they can start getting back to their normal, everyday lives.”

“I love my job; it’s incredibly meaningful to me that I get to go into people’s homes, whether it’s postoperatively or after they leave the hospital due to a medical condition—and help them restore their function so that they can start getting back to their normal, everyday lives,” says Stacey, her enthusiasm and excitement contagious. After working in a hospital setting in her prior job, joining VNSNY eight years ago was a perfect move for her. “I used to make various recommendations for patients’ home when they were getting discharged, but you can never really be sure of the follow-up—and I always felt like I was pawning their care off on their clinicians. Now I literally go into their homes and take it on myself!”

With clients ranging from stroke and fracture patients to people recovering from surgery, Stacey delights in learning what’s most important to her clients—and in thinking outside the box to find solutions. On any given day she might be stepping into the shower with a patient, reorganizing a kitchen or bathroom to ensure safe passage to a microwave or bathtub, rearranging a cupboard, or reconfiguring new techniques or spaces for getting dressed. “I never realized that there would be so much feng shui in this work,” she jokes.

She once had a patient who, after a stroke, was unable to put on her makeup—which had been a critically important part of her routine. “She didn’t want family or friends visiting her unless she had her makeup on, and it’s incredibly difficult to apply makeup with your non-dominant hand,” notes Stacey. Through a creative process involving cleverly angled mirrors, a thicker eyebrow pencil for added stability, a lot of practice sessions, and a bedside table on which she could rest her arm for increased coordination, Stacey worked with her client to perfect the process—even occasionally practicing on dolls. “One day, I walked in and she had her makeup on before I got there. It was such an exciting moment because she’d managed to do it all by herself,” she recalls. “It might not sound like a big or important thing to some people, but for her it was everything. And that was awesome.”