GRAND RAPIDS, Mich., (May 9, 2014) It is Nurses Appreciation Week, a time to recognize the people that go above and beyond day in and day out to help our loved ones. For one registered nurse, helping others was something she knew she wanted to do since she was a child.
Danya Roede is now a physicians assistant for Grand Valley Heath Plan but before that she was a nurse in the ICU.
She was the kid who always carried around a doctors kit and knew she wanted to work in the medical field, being a nurse was her first love but she just never imagined it would come full circle like it did.
It all started after her grandpa was diagnosed with cancer. Danya is originally from the east side of the state but was in Grand Rapids one day as a child for a parade. She says she got a frisbee tossed to her and it had the name of the hospital on it where her grandpa was being treated.
That’s when she got the idea to send money and write a letter to them. At nine years old she was thinking it was a way to make sure they took good care of him.
Years later, Danya dug up that letter. Part of it read:
“Dear Butterworth Foundation, Hi my name is Danya, I want to be a nurse when I grow up. I’m only nine years old but I feel I am needed all over the world.
I hope you find a cure for aids, cancer and blood diseases and I want to help as much as I can. I will give you $6 out of my piggy bank.
My grandpa goes to your hospital, do you know him? Thank you very much for doing what you can to help my grandpa thank you, bye, love Danya B.”
The letter ended up being published in the hospital’s newsletter more than a decade ago, the same hospital she ended up being hired at as a nurse years later.
Now a physicians assistant, Danya says she will never forget her four years as a nurse or the ones that took care of her grandpa, ultimately helping shape what she has become today.
“I think it’s just a skill that all nurses have to just make people feel they’re being taken care of, its pretty priceless,” she said.
