LEWISTON — Registered nurse Nancy Ouellette has been recognized as Central Maine Medical Center’s first DAISY Award recipient.

The DAISY Award is sponsored by the California-based DAISY Foundation and recognizes nurses who consistently demonstrate compassion, critical thinking skills, passion about life, patient- and family-focused care, patient advocacy, support of all health-care team members and a nursing profession role model.

The award was established in 1999 by the family of J. Patrick Barnes, who died at age 33. DAISY is an acronym for “diseases attacking the immune system.” It was created to show gratitude to the nursing profession, because the Barnes family believed that nurses are truly “unsung heroes.”

Ouellette is a staff nurse on CMMC’s Cardiopulmonary Nursing Unit, and serves in a number of other nursing roles as well. She is a facilitator-instructor for RENEW, an ongoing program that helps CMMC caregivers and staff connect with patients and families in a more spiritual way.

She was a founding member of, and still serves on, CMMC’s Professional Practice Committee. She is also a member of the heart failure team, serving as an educational liaison with the Cardiopulmonary Nursing Unit staff. Additionally, she belongs to the La Leche Team, which assists new mothers in developing breast-feeding techniques that will enhance the well-being of infants.

Documentation recommending Ouellette for the DAISY Award noted her listening to families’ concerns and letting them verbalize their fears, as well as her skill at providing “comfort measures not only to the patient, but the extended family as well.”