Nurses and leaders at Sanford Health in Fargo gathered together to celebrate their first ever designation through the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) Magnet® Recognition Program, the most prestigious credential a health care organization can achieve for nursing excellence and quality patient care.
“Everyone has worked so hard for so many years to get to this point,” said Anne Heller, the Magnet program director at Sanford Fargo. “To have external people come and say, ‘you guys do awesome work,’ you know, I can say it and I can see it, but to have external people coming in and validating that really means so much to everyone. It’s just a great day.”
Team effort
Nursing groups at Sanford locations all across the Fargo metro area listened in as David Marshall, executive committee chair of the ANCC announced the honor. Then the celebration was on.
“We have worked so hard for so many years on this,” said Megan Breden, nursing inpatient manager. “The anticipation was exciting. I think all of our units felt like the site visit went so well in February when the survey team was here. I am just excited, and it makes me very proud to be a Sanford nurse.”
“Definitely pride,” said Michael Burson, equity and experience advisor. “We’ve heard since the beginning that this has been a long process. You know, 20 years is a really long road. So, feeling like we’re the group that crossed the finish line is pretty cool. But also understanding there were a lot of people that got us to this point over the years.”
Road to recognition
Receiving a Magnet designation is a yearslong process, requiring hospitals and staff to verify that more than 100 Magnet standards are met in documentation, as well as during an on-site visit by the ANCC. This gold standard for nursing excellence signifies superior safety and quality, improved patient outcomes, high patient satisfaction rates and increased job satisfaction among nurses.
Until now the only other Magnet hospital in all of North Dakota was Sanford Health in Bismarck. Now Sanford Fargo joins the list, which is something the staff is sincerely proud of.
“Sanford does so much to support us as nurses and I just feel so incredibly proud to be part of an organization that is striving for excellence and striving to support their nurses and striving to improve care for patients,” said Cassie Pieschke, registered nurse.
Nurses at the event also talked about the validation this honor provides for the entire team.
“Sometimes we hear about the bad, or the things that aren’t going well, so it’s really, really important and imperative to hear about all the things that do go well. This is just one way for us to be recognized in that way,” said Kayla Howard, nurse scientist.
“We have created our environments and ingrained the work into what we do every day,” said Kristen Jones, director of nursing at Sanford Fargo. “So the designation really just states that we are walking the walk, we are doing what we say we’re doing, and we’re going to continue to maintain this moving forward as well.”
Perhaps no one was more excited to receive the designation than Theresa Larson, the chief nursing officer at Sanford Fargo. Larson has been with the hospital for more than 36 years, serving as chief nursing officer for the last seven years, and when the announcement was made it was Larson who was showered with confetti.
“It’s quite an honor. It really is the biggest honor that nurses can get and so I think recognizing them for that is amazing,” Larson said. “It shows their dedication to quality. It shows their dedication to safety. It shows their dedication to each other. Then absolutely above all, it shows the dedication that they have to the patients that we serve.”
Learn more
- US News ranks Sanford best hospitals in Dakotas
- What makes nursing different at Sanford Health
- Culture, education lead to 4th Magnet honor in Bismarck
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Posted In Awards & Recognition, Company News, Fargo, Nursing and Nursing Support
