Personal Care
Latest Personal Care News
VNSNY Commemorates Memorial Day: Hear What Memorial Day Means to Our VNSNY Veterans
May 26, 2021–On Monday, May 31st, America celebrates Memorial Day and honors those who have made the ultimate sacrifice for our country and our freedoms. In this special Memorial Day video, Frontline interviewed several VNSNY staff who are veterans and asked what Memorial Day means to them. To hear their moving tributes, click on the video below. In addition to this special Memorial Day video, we are also pleased to share the following poem by Robert Longley, which was adapted by Joe Vitti, Director of VNSNY’s Hospice Veterans Program.
Meet This Year’s Liota and Marren Award Winners!
May 25, 2021–As part of VNSNY’s ongoing Nurses Month celebration, the 2021 Liota and Marren Award winners have just been announced. Congratulations to the honorees, Collette Hendricks and Tameka McCabe, who were nominated by their VNSNY colleagues and selected by a committee of nursing leaders! Collette Hendricks, Psychiatric Nurse, Winner of the Marilyn Liota Award The Liota Award to Promote Cultural Diversity in Nursing Leadership, named after long-time VNSNY nurse and Queens Regional Vice President Marilyn Liota, is awarded each year to help an exemplary VNSNY nurse realize her or his leadership potential. The award provides a $1,500 scholarship for expenses related to nursing studies, continuing professional development, or communication/English language skills development. “I’ve always had compassion for people with mental illness.” Very early on during the COVID pandemic, when Zoom meetings were being held about pivoting to remote patient care during lockdown, Collette wouldn’t hear of it. “What’s going to happen
“30 Minutes with Dan” Celebrates National Nurses Month!
May 24, 2021–We’re pleased to bring you the May episode of “30 Minutes with Dan” — the video talk show hosted by VNSNY’s President and CEO Dan Savitt. This 30-minute monthly program is designed to be watched in one viewing or in multiple viewings — whichever works best for you. In this special Nurses Month episode that you won’t want to miss, Dan interviews VNSNY nurses Carmite Maurice, Amashika DaCosta, Erika Cingel, David Heron, Tiffany Blakney, and Fredlya Urena. From Central Park to Roberto Clemente Park in the Bronx, Dan travels the city to celebrate our nursing staff. To view, click here below! To watch more episodes of 30-minutes with Dan, click here.
Here They Are, the Most Recent Patient Letters and CHOICE Member Commendations!
May 21, 2021–Over 40 staff members are featured in the latest patient letters and CHOICE member commendations. Read them here. Click here to read the latest patient letters. Click here to read the most recent CHOICE member commendations. GREAT job, everyone! To read other Letters and Commendations from previous months, click here.
May 2021 Patient Letters
May 21, 2021–The COVID-19 pandemic has continued to prove the resilience and dedication of our entire VNSNY staff. The following are excerpts from a few of the many recent letters, phone calls, and emails that we’ve received from grateful patients and family members that reflect an outstanding consumer experience. “A Wonderful Job of Caring” Bronx—The daughter of a Bronx VNSNY Hospice patient called to give special thanks to licensed social worker Alisha Freeman and nurses Judith Spencer-Thomas and Selina Stewart-Williams, all of whom provided hospice care to her mother. She added that VNSNY Hospice had done “such a wonderful job of caring,” first for her father—who was also a hospice patient years earlier—and now her mother. “We Are So Grateful” “I am writing on behalf of my late father, and my mother, as the superb work of your staff sustained the both of them throughout his final year
Celebrating Nurses Month: Check Out These Long-Lost Photos of Early VNSNY Nurses!
May 17, 2021–As we continue our celebration of National Nurses Month, Frontline looks at this year’s theme, “Nurses Make a Difference,” through the lens of history. The fact is, VNSNY nurses have been making a difference in the lives of New Yorkers for 128 years. So what’s changed and what has stayed the same after all these years? A recent treasure trove of photos—featuring VNSNY nurses hard at work—gives us a hint! The National Institute of Health recently featured the online exhibition Outside/Inside:Immigration, Migration, and Health Care in the United States, which chronicles Lillian Wald’s efforts to support immigrants to New York City, starting with her creation of the Henry Street Visiting Nurse Service on New York’s Lower East Side—then the world’s largest immigrant neighborhood—in 1893. Wald realized how visiting nurses could play a crucial role in reducing death rates, helping immigrants adjust to life in the United States, and advocating for the
“30 Minutes With Dan” Celebrates Diversity Month!
April 29, 2021–We’re pleased to bring you the April episode of “30 Minutes with Dan” — the video talk show hosted by VNSNY’s President and CEO Dan Savitt. This 30-minute monthly program is designed to be watched in one viewing or in multiple viewings — whichever works best for you. In this episode, Dan salutes National Celebrate Diversity Month with visits to VNSNY’s Chinatown Community Center and to Elmhurst, Queens, which was an epicenter early in the pandemic. Watch as staff from across the organization, including Cidric Trinidad, Orlando Tsang, Manisha Vijayaraghavan, Arcina Batista, Chaim Backman, Emelia Botchway and Sung Yoon, talk with Dan about what makes a community special and the importance of respecting a person’s cultural perspective when delivering care. To watch this special episode, click here below. To watch more episodes of 30-minutes with Dan, click here.
“What is one fascinating thing you’ve learned about your culture and something you’ve learned about another?”
April 28, 2021–To commemorate Celebrate Diversity Month, “Ask VNSNY” host Amery Moultry offers a short summary of the cultural diversity found in New York City, and then asks this question of employees from around the organization. To hear their responses as well as Amery’s tips on how you can celebrate cultural diversity month, click here below.
Meet VNSNY’s New Green Belts — The Graduates of Our First-Ever Lean Six Sigma Course
April 16, 2021–From Reducing Hospitalizations to Creating a Roadmap to 4 Stars, VNSNY’s Green Belt Grads Focused on Improving Patient Care Lean Six Sigma may sound like a college fraternity, but it’s actually a set of management tools used by organizations worldwide to help them operate more efficiently and improve the quality of their services or products. Tony Dawson, Vice President of Quality and Customer Experience, launched VNSNY’s first Lean Six Sigma program last year, leading 20 staff members through a six-month course that prepared them to become certified Lean Six Sigma Green Belts. (The program uses some of the language of martial arts, with White Belts, Yellow Belts and Green Belts overseen by more experienced Black Belts and Master Black Belts.) Despite the challenges of holding the course virtually due to COVID-19, the course was a resounding success. To encourage cross-fertilization and fresh perspectives, the participants were drawn from across VNSNY—including