Creating a makeshift sleep-over with popcorn and plenty of pillows for a young dad, now bald and bedridden due to terminal cancer, and his bubbly 4-year-old daughter wearing her Disney princess nightgown.
That’s just one example of the extreme kindness and compassion Anne DeLuca, BSN, provides as an inpatient nurse at Penn Hospice at Rittenhouse. It’s also one of many reasons Independence Blue Cross (IBX) selected her as one of only three “Celebrate Caring” winners from among 700 submissions — nurses who truly go above and beyond for patients and families.
According to her nomination letter, DeLuca not only provides exceptional clinical care, but offers something else. “It’s immeasurable, but unmistakable, it’s invisible but palpable. It is a beautiful blend of being sincere, bestowing a ‘peace of mind,’ being human, building trust and being able to ‘read the room’ and then enrobe it with empathy.”
In pulling together this one special time for the patient and his young daughter, “Anne created a meaningful memory which that young girl can carry with her through her entire life.”
IBX will also donate $1,500 to the charity of choice for each winner. DeLuca requested that her donation be made to Camp Erin in Philadelphia, a Bereavement Camp for children.