Jadira Amill Named Hospital's First Daisy Award Winner

Jadira Amill, a psychiatric nurse for the last eight years, has been named as Jersey City Medical Center’s first recipient of The Daisy Award for Extraordinary Nurses.

She was selected from 20 nominees by the Medical Center’s Quality and Safety Nursing Council based on quality, safety and evidence of nurses connecting with their patients.

According to her nomination, “Jadira has gone out of her way to care for her patients. She has broken through patient resistance and even language barrier to deliver excellent care.”

Jadira, who holds a Master’s degree in mental health nursing, started at the medical center in June 2003 as part of the Earn & Learn program.  She is a clinical ladder III – a point-based system that rewards staff nurses for excellence in practice that embodies the institution’s mission, vision and Magnet philosophy.  She was also the first nurse to win the hospital’s Employee of the Month award since the program began.

The Daisy Award was established in 1999 in memory of Patrick Barnes, who died at the age of 33 from the complications of a blood disorder.  His family felt compelled to recognize extraordinary nurses like those that cared for him on an ongoing basis.

In 2009, the American Nurses Credentialing Center announced its support for the Daisy Award for all Magnet organizations – Jersey City Medical Center became a Magnet Award hospital in 2008, emblematic of excellence in nursing care – and those on their journey to Magnet certification.

Patients, families, staff and physicians can nominate a nurse each month.  Winners receive a pin, an award certificate, a healer’s touch sculpture, and Cinnabons (Patrick’s favorite food) for his or her unit and team.

The aroma of the Cinnabons wafting through the hospital will alert everyone that another extraordinary nurse has been recognized.