“Being passionate and dedicated to what you’re doing is the best thing you can do for your patients and their families. That’s obvious to me. I don’t see any other way that I could do it.”
At Sheba, the focus is always on the patient, but today, we would like to turn the spotlight to one of our dedicated caregivers.
We sat down with Daphna Hutt, an incredible nurse who has been working for Sheba since 1992. A pediatric transplant coordinator in the Hemato-Oncology Department, Daphna told us that she chose her profession to “take care of people and families,” adding: “If I lose this passion, I don’t think I should continue working in healthcare for one more minute.”
As a transplant coordinator, she accompanies patients over a long period of time, forming long-lasting relationships with everyone in her care. According to Daphna: “Every patient and family have a different background and needs, and we try to answer all their needs. As a caregiver, it can be challenging, especially when there’s also a donor in the picture. There are a lot of good moments, but also tough moments.”
While professional “tough moments” can mean a tight deadline or a tense conversation with a colleague for most of us, Daphna’s can provide some perspective: “Patients come in for transplants, and sometimes things go wrong, and they go to the ICU. We always know it can happen, but it is always difficult, and when you see the families and what they are going through, it’s rough.”
While Daphna recognizes the difficulties faced by parents of ill children, who all dream of seeing their loved one cured and living normal lives, she puts special emphasis on international patients, who come from different cultures and have different needs. “At times, it can be challenging, but I’m a nurse, and taking care of people is, for me, what it’s all about.”
While the challenges remain, we wanted to know what gives Daphna joy.
“I think the best thing for me is seeing the patients a few years later. We treat them as babies, and then they come in a few years later, and they are either adults or sometimes parents. That’s worth everything. When the patient comes in, we don’t know how it’s going to end up. We hope for the best, but you never know. And even those kids who had very complex transplant or treatment courses and are doing well for many years – that’s our best reward. And we have many, many patients and many families like that, and that’s still really exciting.”
Thank you, Daphna, for your dedication and commitment to patient care. You serve as an inspiration to us all.
