Please introduce yourselves.
Diane:
I'm Diane Ogren. I graduated from nursing school in 1964, and I attended my first NTI in 1974 in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Maddi:
I'm Maddi Flanagan. I have been a nurse for six years. I attended NTI virtually for the first time in 2022, and I attended in person in Philadelphia for the first time in 2023.
Describe your experience attending your first NTI.
Diane:
There were 2,000 critical care nurses, which was pretty large at that time, in New Orleans, and the CCRN exam was offered for the first time to the group there. I had taken the CCRN for validating purposes in 1973, so I was one of the first 19 in the country to be board certified in critical care, which I still maintain. We took a bus to Tulane University and practiced with Swan-Ganz on dogs.
The lectures were primarily by doctors at that time. I remember Marvin Birnbaum from the University of Wisconsin at Madison who lectured on shock, and he was the last session every day, and by the last day people were canceling their plane reservations to stay and listen to him. He was just amazing.
My husband had come with me and the kids, and we all stayed there. We took a train to New Orleans, because we didn't know if there would be those trains once the kids grew up. So that was pretty exciting. And from the hotel to the banquet that night, Pete Fountain and his band played, and we all had a parade down to the convention center. Oh, it was wonderful.
Maddi:
I went with my co-workers for my first NTI. And I didn't really know what to expect, because I had done the virtual the year before and I absolutely loved the virtual. So I was like, oh man, how can this get even better? But going in person and getting to meet everybody from all across the country was amazing. Getting to talk with all of the nurses who are teaching, everyone who has their wonderful PhDs and all of the things that I have even used to study as a nurse. A lot of those nurses who created all those study guides were the ones that were teaching all those classes.
So for me, it felt very full circle getting to meet them. All the events that were hosted as far as the Nurses Night Out and the guest speakers, I absolutely loved that. It was a step away from learning and getting to have more of a fun side. We do so much in our jobs, and we give so much that it was kind of nice to step away for one week, learn a little bit, and at night you get to have a little bit of fun and let loose. So I absolutely loved it.
What does AACN’s theme, “Rising Together,” mean to you?
Maddi:
I attended last year when they announced the theme and right off the bat, I was like, oh, I resonate with this. I think that the nursing community as a whole has gone through a lot this past couple of years, as most of us know, through the pandemic and then kind of coming out of that. I think Rising Together really is nurses coming together and uniting and finding common ground and allowing the seasoned nurses to dive in and teach these newer nurses while these newer nurses can teach us.
Diane:
I agree. I think the collaboration of critical care nurses is so important. Working together like sisters and brothers. We're together, and we're supporting each other and focusing on the patient and not just the task.
Diane, you've had the good fortune of hearing all of the AACN themes as they were introduced. Do you have a favorite?
Diane:
Connie Barden’s “Bold Voices, Fearless and Essential.” We have to speak out. We have to do what's right. And when you see something, say something. You've got to make things better.
Why did you choose nursing?
Diane:
I chose nursing because I wanted to help people. I wore my aunt's nursing cap from the time I could walk. I bandaged my brothers and my pets. I took all the classes that I could in high school to prepare me for going to nursing school. I never thought of anything else.
Maddi:
I knew from a very young age that I wanted to be a nurse. I had a grandma, an aunt and an uncle who were all nurses. And they worked in different specialties. My aunt was working in the NICU with the smallest babies, and my grandma was working in geriatrics. Every time they would talk it was like they had this outpouring of love for the profession. And so that was my first interest. I felt like I had a very natural caretaker mentality. And I think that once I learned more about nursing and what nursing had to offer, I knew this is what's for me.
Who has made the biggest impact on your career?
Maddi:
Definitely my family members who were nurses. That shaped my overall feeling of nursing and healthcare as a profession in general. And then once I became a nurse, my first ICU job, my mentors. I didn't think I wanted to work in an ICU when I first graduated, but I took a leap of faith and one night there was an opening and I applied. I jumped right into it, and right off the bat my preceptor, Lindsey, was amazing. She was like I'll show you why I love everything that has to do with the profession and training the next generation. They [my mentors] encouraged me to precept, they encouraged me to study for my CCRN; all the things that have shaped me into the nurse I am today.
Diane:
My Aunt Lois. She took me along to the hospital with her from when I was 13 years old, and I could feed babies or feed grandmas. It was a 29-bed community hospital in rural Wisconsin. So I could sit on the table in the OR and watch the doctors do surgery. And they sent recommendations for me when I started nursing school. But to get into critical care, I had a baby the first year I got out of school, and I came back to the hospital and worked as a float. And they would put me on whatever floor needed extra help for an extra-sick patient. And I did that for about six months, and then I was told, we've had some resignations in ICU, and that's where you're going next.
So I went to work in the ICU. I was on call the 4th of July weekend, and I had only been there a month. I had an open-heart patient recovering. I had a priest in one room with an MI and a couple of other patients. I had an LPN and an aide to help me. We didn't get a lot of help back then in critical care. And I got a patient from the recovery room.
I got a patient from the ER with a GI bleed. I called my supervisor. I said, ‘I'm sick to my stomach. I'm going to throw up. I’ve got to go home.’ She said, ‘No, you're not going home. I'll come and help you.’ If I'd gone home, I probably never would have come back. But I loved it. I moved to a suburb and got a job in a new hospital in ICU. And from there, that was in 1966, I have been in critical care ever since.
What is a pivotal moment that marked your nursing journey?
Diane:
It was very exciting when I published a case study in Heart & Lung, the Journal of Cardiopulmonary and Acute Care in November/December 1973. And it was on a patient with acute viral pneumonia that we used an ECMO machine for the first time. We had a nun from the dog lab, her assistant running the pump, and Dr. Gannon speaking with Edwards in New York on how we were doing with this patient on cardiopulmonary bypass with the membrane oxygenator for 61.5 hours. He survived and went home. Probably the first time it was used successfully on an adult, so I published the case study, and that was the most exciting thing ever.
Maddi:
Working through COVID. I had been a nurse for about three years before COVID hit, and then out of nowhere everything we know is different. I was working in a CVICU at a level one trauma center where we specialized in ECMO. And we got hit pretty hard in the center of Phoenix. Having to figure out the changing policies; all the information that we were getting was constantly changing. That was the biggest thing during my nursing career, but I'm sure there'll be plenty more to come.
Maddi, do you have a question for Diane?
Maddi:
Looking back to when you were a new nurse around NTI 1974, what technological advances made the biggest imprints on your practice?
Diane:
I learned about pacemakers when I was a student nurse, and we went to the University of Minnesota and we saw C. Walton-Lillehei do a tetralogy of Fallot through the dome. And they took us to the dog lab where there was a calf wearing this thing around its neck the size of a dinner plate. And they said when children have heart surgery, sometimes they come out with a heart rate in the 30s and Dr. Lillehei and [engineer] Earl Bakken are working in a garage to invent something that would pace the heart. If I had money to invest then, I'd be rich now, because that's Medtronic.
Maddi:
It's crazy hearing things that were so new for you then that have become so normal in our practice now.
Diane:
What do you think is the most upcoming thing with critical care at this point?
Maddi:
I'm realizing it's constantly changing on a personal level what my desires and my goals are as a nurse. When I first graduated nursing school I had this vision in my mind. I wanted to start as an OR nurse and then once I learned more about critical care, I was like, OK, well, I'm going to be an ICU nurse, I'm going to go to CRNA school, I'll get every certification I can and then COVID happened and I took on the role of preceptor and teacher.
What I've learned over the past six years and what I tell new nurses now: Don't be so set in one thing. It's OK to push toward goals, but along the way, your priorities might shift and that is OK. You'll learn things about yourself. You'll learn things about your patients, the things that you actually enjoy about your job. And nursing's so great because you'll have a lot of opportunities to try different things.
What advice would you offer a newly graduated nurse entering the workforce today?
Diane:
I would tell them after one year, take classes so that you can take your test and get your CCRN. After you've been there two years, you should have your certification.
Maddi:
I always tell everyone that I'm training, especially right after they graduate – don't forget your why. Why did I do this? Why did I choose this profession? What is my goal for myself, my patients and the job? I think if you can remember what your why is, it will help push you through and give you the motivation and reassurance to why you chose this career and will help you overall to stay aligned with yourself.
Diane:
Take your wins as a group and take your falls as a group also. Just stay together.
Are you going to NTI Denver this year?
Maddi:
Yes. And I already have some co-workers who want to tag along for all the fun.
Diane:
Once you've gone you want to go every year.
Maddi:
It's true. The environment is very contagious and it's fun, and I left feeling very rejuvenated last year.
Diane:
Yes, it really makes you feel glad to be a nurse.
Maddi:
It does.
Join Us at NTI 2024 in Denver
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