Dr. Winsome Panton
Janis Snyder
Nurse practitioner AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin
Chief nurse anesthetist The Methodist Hospital, Houston
Ben Smidt
A
s a self-proclaimed math and science nerd headed to Marquette, Janis Snyder, Nurs ’69, was fascinated with cardiac surgery. “I had read about Dr. Michael DeBakey,” she says, referencing the pioneer heart surgeon who performed the first successful coronary artery bypass and pioneered the use of Dacron grafts to repair large blood vessels in aneurysm surgery. But she was also a huge fan of Ben Casey, a popular TV show about doctors, saying, “One of the nurses on the show was a nurse anesthetist, and she was the character I really admired.” In the end, Snyder went on to work as a certified registered nurse anesthetist for 15 years with none other than DeBakey in Houston. Today, she is chief nurse anesthetist at Methodist Hospital DeBakey Heart and Vascular Center, one of the top transplant centers in the country. Snyder credits Marquette for supplying her with the core values of what it means to be a nurse. “Many of our instructors were nuns, who exhibited this caring, this interaction, with patients,” she says. “You couldn’t help but feel it and be a part of it.” Recalling her undergraduate clinical rotations, Snyder says, “I loved spending time with patients — which is funny because I ended up in anesthesia, where most of my patients are actually asleep.” Many of her patients today are transplant patients. “We’re not just doing anesthesia. It’s more like nonstop resuscitation,” Snyder says. “We are taking critically ill patients in need of organ transplants and trying to optimize the function of their failing organs until we can replace them. This applies especially to our heart and lung transplant patients. We are often optimizing an organ that has realistically been without an oxygen and
10 MARQUETT E UNIV ERSITY
Denny Angelle, The Methodist Hospital
blood supply for a period of time and still trying to improve the function of other organs that may have been weakened due to a failing heart or failing lungs. It seems like ‘keeping the patient asleep’ is the easiest part of my job. We try to head off disaster.” It’s not uncommon for Snyder to work a 60-hour week. “It’s a — Janis Snyder difficult job. It really is. But if you’re challenged and enjoy the intensity, you fall in love with it,” she says. She has known that love for most of her life. “During the surgical period, I look at myself as the patient’s guardian and protector,” she says. “I am there not only to see that they are unaware of the surgery and that they don’t experience any pain, but also to see that all their organs remain undamaged and at optimal function. Should they lose blood, I am there to replace it. If their potassium is low, I make sure it is corrected. From treating high blood sugar to a failing heart, this is what I do for my sleeping patient.” But her biggest interaction with patients is in the preoperative period, when her patients are wide awake. She gathers medical information, describing the anesthetic process and inserting intravenous and arterial lines. “That is part of what I enjoy the most,” she says. “It is when I get to hold their hand — make eye contact — which I think is extremely important. I really watch body language to see how stressed a patient is and then try to find something to talk about that will ease the stress. This may mean talking about their hometown, children, pets, whatever. It is always about communication and empathy.” And that goes back to the philosophy at Marquette: ensuring patients are receiving what they need and want. “Those values have always been there,” she says.
“During the surgical period, I look at myself as the patient’s guardian and protector.”