{"id":154369,"date":"2019-09-19T08:42:44","date_gmt":"2019-09-19T12:42:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?post_type=school-college-post&p=154369"},"modified":"2019-09-20T10:09:30","modified_gmt":"2019-09-20T14:09:30","slug":"im-nurse-cant-let","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2019\/09\/im-nurse-cant-let\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I\u2019m a Nurse\u2026 I Can\u2019t Let You Do This\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

The truest thing Lauren Brennan<\/a> \u201907 (NUR) \u00a0says anyone ever told her in nursing school was, \u201cPay attention during psych, because it will follow you in whatever department you decide to work in.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brennan, a urology nurse practitioner who joined UConn Health three years ago, never worked in psychiatry. But acting on that advice \u2013 and on the instincts of a person who chose nursing as a profession \u2013 very likely saved a life the morning of Aug. 27.<\/p>\n

Brennan was reporting to the GI procedures center for an 8 a.m. case. On her walk from her car to the building, she noticed a man who appeared to be distressed standing near the edge of an elevated wall. She asked if he needed help.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe said, \u2018I need your help to get up here, I need to jump,\u2019\u201d Brennan says.<\/p>\n

It would have been a roughly three-story drop.<\/p>\n

\u201cI dropped my bag and went over, and he kept trying to climb up, so I tried to engage him in conversation, which he wasn\u2019t terribly interested in having. I just kept talking to him, and held his hand at one point. I was trying anything to distract him,\u201d Brennan says. \u201cI said, \u2018You know I\u2019m a nurse, I have to help people, I can\u2019t let you do this.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

By then she had called 911. There was no one else around. It was a matter of stalling him until help could arrive.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was an electrical box over in the corner that he noticed, and was trying to get his foot up on to help him climb,\u201d Brennan says. \u201cAnd then I realized, if he came any closer to climbing over, I was going to have to pull him down, and potentially hurt him and\/or myself. But the police arrived right then and swooped in and pulled him out of harm\u2019s way.\u201d<\/p>\n

She left her information with the police and reported to work.<\/p>\n

\u201cLauren exemplified extreme compassion and bravery while remaining focused on the situation and activating additional resources,\u201d says Linda Mladek, assistant nurse manager in the endoscopy unit. \u201cHere in the procedure center, we are all proud to have her as our colleague.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brennan was offered workplace resources including the Employee Assistance Program and the chaplain, but she says all she needed was a few minutes to collect herself. Moments later, it was on with the scheduled procedure.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m glad I was in the right place at the right time and able to help,\u201d Brennan says. \u201cI also greatly appreciate Linda\u2019s kindness and helping me to debrief at the time, and her genuine concern for my wellbeing. I\u2019m so fortunate to work with a great team at UConn!\u201d<\/p>\n

She says it was a surreal experience, almost as if she was in a movie.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt at times he didn\u2019t want my help, and that was the most upsetting thing about it,\u201d Brennan says. \u201cI hope he gets whatever services and help he needs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UConn Health nurse practitioner shares her story of how she talked a disturbed patient off the ledge.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":111,"featured_media":154368,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1877,1868],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2010],"class_list":["post-154369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nur","category-meds"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-10 13:48:05","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/111"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154369"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154369\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/154368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154369"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=154369"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=154369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}