UNIVERSITY OF MARY ALUMNI step up to serve during the pandemic supportive but worried. She has two little boys she was leaving behind. But she knew it was something she had to do. “For me, I knew I had to go to NYC. I had an overwhelming gut feeling that this was my calling; this is why I went into healthcare.” Evans decided to go to New York. She Evans, center, featured on the news during her time in New York. was placed in the Coney Island (CI) Hospital Emergency Department in Brooklyn, NY– literally thrown into the frontlines in the Emergency Department (ED) of a huge metropolitan hospital. Ninetyfi ve percent of patients in the ED were rooke Evans, ’18, always planned to COVID-19 patients, and all were very sick be a nurse. “I followed in my mom’s because many would wait to come in over footsteps,” she said. “She’s a nurse, and so fear of the virus. Many other healthcare growing up I always wanted to be one.” workers at the hospital were also temporary, Evans sees it as a calling–as a nurse, she is due to many of CI’s doctors and nurses meant to help people. After attending the becoming infected with COVID-19 University of Mary as an undergraduate, themselves. While Evans was there, seven Brooke returned to Mary for her Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree. Ordinarily, CI staff members lost their life due to she is a nurse practitioner in the Orthopedic COVID-19, and many more were out sick for weeks at a time. Trauma Unit at Montana Orthopedics in Butte, Montana. But when the COVID-19 But Evans’ time in New York was not all pandemic hit the states, she heard a new about devastation. It was also about the calling: to go serve on the frontlines in New strength of the human spirit in the face of York City for six weeks. difficulties. “It was amazing to see a group It was a Thursday afternoon when she got of strangers come from all over the United States to band together during a time of the call – she had 24 hours to decide if she wanted to go, and then 24 hours to pack up uncertainty. The passion, heart, and never– give-up attitude that I saw was something I her life and get to New York City. “I had so many emotions running through me: scared, will never forget,” she said. “We shared many tears and laughs together. The bond that we excited, anxious, nervous, and willing,” all formed was something amazing.” she said. Her mother and husband were
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vans credits her University of Mary education and her amazing instructors for her preparedness to serve. “Especially during grad school, all of our instructors were amazing and so helpful and led by example. They taught me how to look at the big picture, to dig in, and to do what you have to do. The graduate nursing program set me up to make it through that situation. “The University of Mary set me up for success for sure. It was an amazing program, and I left feeling confident not only going into my first job but going out to work the frontlines in a pandemic.” Evans said her experience in New York had a huge impact on her personally and professionally. “I think that it was something I was called to do. Hopefully I impacted a lot of people and helped them when I was out there. It changed my outlook on a lot of things in life.” Some people have called Evans a hero, but she doesn’t agree. “If you go into the medical field, you go for a reason, and that’s to help people,” she said. “I would go back in a heartbeat.”
Evans in her personal protective equipment at work at Coney Island Hospital.
