May 14, 2002

FOR RELEASE: Immediately

Hospital Recognizes Outstanding Clinical Employees

Debbie Burke, Gwen Wessel and Linda Ervin were selected by their peers as the registered nurse, licensed practical nurse and unlicensed staff member to be the recipients of the 2002 Nursing Excellence Award at Kent & Queen Anne's Hospital. The award is presented annually during Nurses Week to nursing team members who provide direct patient care. Candidates are nominated by Hospital employees and selected by a panel of judges from the community.

PHOTO- Named as recipients of the Nursing Excellence Award at Kent & Queen Anne's Hospital were (from left) Gwen Wessel, LPN, Debbie Burke, RN, and Linda Ervin, operation room technician. The awards are presented each year during National Nurse's Week to nursing team members. Any Hospital employee may nominate the individuals; an impartial panel of nurses from the community participates in the selection process.

As a maternity nurse, Burke is very involved in childbirth education. "Students in her classes are always complimentary of her sincere concern and vast knowledge of the subject matter," noted one of her peers. In addition to childbirth classes, she teaches adult and infant/child CPR classes and a class designed to help older siblings understand the arrival of a new baby in the family. Burke holds a bachelor's degree from Randolph-Macon Women's College and obtained her nursing education form the McQueen Gibbs Willis School of Nursing. She joined the Hospital maternity staff in 1989.

A thirty-year veteran at Kent & Queen Anne's Hospital, Wessel currently works on the intermediate care unit where she serves as a preceptor for new staff members. Her peers nominated her as LPN of the year to recognize the caring attitude she extends to all patients, her loyalty and dependability. Her attention to completing assigned work correctly has made Wessel a welcome member of the nursing team. The Centreville resident is a graduate of Queen Anne's County High School's licensed practical nurse program.

As an operation room technician, Ervin is responsible for maintaining the operation room supplies inventory, preparing supplies and equipment required for each surgical case, prepping patients, and over seeing the environmental cleaning of operating rooms and surgical equipment. One of her peers points out, "She makes it possible for the rest of us to do our jobs seamlessly and without distraction. She pitches in to keep use of the rooms on schedule; each time I enter a clean room I am gratefully for Linda's ability to think ahead."

While still in high school, she began her career as a nursing assistant at Magnolia Hall Rehabilitation & Nursing Center. She began working the Hospital 1993 as a sterile processing technician and joined the operating room staff five years later. Ervin serves as a preceptor for new staff members and frequently assists in presenting nursing staff inservices. She is certified as sterile processing technician.

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