The thrills! The planning!
The tireless effort!

Utah nurses make their mark at Winter Olympics

by Susan Trossman, RN

At the XIX Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, great athletes like U.S. short track skater Apolo Anton Ohno, Canadian pairs skaters Jamie Sale and David Peltier, and Croatian giant slalom skier Janica Kostelic were front and center. But behind the scenes, there were scores of judges, Olympic officials and other event organizers, overt and covert security staff and -- some 170 nurse volunteers.

The nurses, including RNs from the Utah Nurses Association (UNA), were among the roughly 1,400 health care personnel on hand at the Winter Games to provide acute and preventive care, as well as to lend their expertise for other tasks.

UNA member Sylvia McKee was one of 170 nurses who volunteered their time and talent during the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

Their efforts, however, did not just start Feb. 8 when the Olympic torch was officially lit. UNA members and other nurses were intimately involved in planning for the future health care needs of visitors to their fair city.

In early 1997, a core group of UNA nurses decided they wanted RNs to take an active role in the upcoming Olympics. Realizing it was a huge undertaking, they invited representatives from nursing specialty organizations, Sigma Theta Tau International chapters, area hospitals and other practice settings to participate in a spring brainstorming summit, according to UNA member Sylvia McKee, MN, RN, BC.

"We wanted to unite nurses around Utah, just like the world was uniting for the Games," said McKee, a staff development and education coordinator at a Veterans Administration facility in Salt Lake. "And we wanted to determine the special contribution nurses could make."

The UNA, Utah Nurse Practitioners, Utah School Nurse Association and other nursing groups -- which became known as the Utah Nurses Coalition (UNC) -- decided to concentrate largely on health promotion activities. One of their major contributions involved helping to fund a health promotions project called a "Healthier You by 2002 -- Utah's Health Legacy." This project was created by another health care coalition, which included representatives from UNA, the American Medical Association, the Utah Public Health Department and the University of Utah.

"Each Olympic site is required to provide an educational program to the community," explained UNA member Lynne Calame, RN, MeD, who served on the Healthier You committee. "In the past, the programs have always been aimed at children. We decided to offer health care education to adults, and the Salt Lake Organizing Committee (SLOC) endorsed our program."

For this project, the Healthier You committee created materials -- including posters and brochures with health tips -- to promote healthier lifestyles. In addition, special events were held in each of the four years leading up in the Olympics. They included health promotion activities in health and fitness, nutrition, smoking cessation and mammography. For the fitness promotion, for example, one-mile walking events called "Gold Medal Miles" were held throughout the state. Upon completion, participants received a pin.

"We essentially wanted every Utah resident to be a gold medal winner when it comes to health," said Calame, a Salt Lake City School District nurse.

UNA and nursing groups also took on their own project. They created health promotion bookmarks that said "Utah Nurses Welcome You" and included information on the signs, symptoms and treatment of altitude sickness, hypothermia and dehydration -- potentially common problems during the Games. The 170,000 bookmarks were printed in English, French, German and Japanese and were available at hotels, restaurants, information kiosks and other sites around the city.

In another volunteer activity, McKee served as chair of the 2002 RN Volunteer Planning Committee, where she assisted in determining the number and qualifications needed for nurse volunteers at the Games. She then helped screen applicants.

Once the Olympics were under way, McKee and Calame were among the many nurse volunteers who worked in various capacities, including providing acute and preventive care at stationary clinics and on mobile spectator teams.

UNA member and family nurse practitioner Penny Jensen, MS, APRN, was one of six nurse practitioners (NPs) who worked at a clinic at the "main media center," where they saw mostly members of the broadcast media and press from around the world.

"Our venue was the only one credentialed to use nurse practitioners as providers, and it was the first time NPs were used in the Olympics," said Jensen, who also volunteered in planning the health promotions campaigns. "It was a great venue to promote the NP practice, and we were well-received by the media."

The main media center opened Jan. 7, and was staffed by one NP or physician and one RN each shift, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Averaging more than 75 patients a day, clinic staff saw a number of patients with upper respiratory tract infections, including the flu. They also had to adjust the medications of patients with asthma, diabetes and uncontrolled hypertension who were affected by the high altitude, Jensen said.

Perhaps the biggest challenge for the health care teams were language barriers. Although translators were available, many of them were not familiar with medical terminology, Jensen said. And trying to sort out Russian medications, for example, in the PDR also proved challenging but not insurmountable without some extra research.

In a different role, Calame served as an athlete escort, which meant she followed winning athletes around until they completed their required testing for banned substances. That allowed her the opportunity to rub shoulders with athletes like Russian pairs skater Yelena Berezhnaya and gold medal winner Sarah Hughes.

"Sarah was so excited and just delightful," Calame said. "I got to go with her when she spoke to the media."

Calame also served as a technical officer, which involved overseeing athletes as they provided samples for testing. (The first four winners and two random athletes in each event were checked.)

McKee, on the other hand, worked as a "generalist" with SLOC Medical Services and Doping Control. She assisted the International Olympic Committee Medical Commission members with their meeting and transportation needs. She also helped dispatch couriers to various venues to transport athletes' specimens to the approved laboratory.

During the Olympics, health care volunteers saw everything from heart attacks to strains and sprains to respiratory infections.

And Ginny Borncamp, director of medical services for SLOC, reported that there were 11,453 "patient encounters" as of Feb. 26. (The Paralympics immediately followed the Winter Games, so venues remained open.)

"The nurses who assisted were just awesome," said Borncamp, adding that the IOC Medical Commission also was impressed with the volunteers. "They said the staff was incredibly competent and well-organized, and they were amazed by the warmth in which care was provided."

Though exhausted, Calame, McKee and Jensen were thrilled with their Olympic experience.

"It was an incredible experience to provide medical care to people from Russia, Finland, Switzerland and other countries around the world," Jensen said.

"It was absolutely glorious," Calame said. "It was very rewarding and more than I thought it would be."

Said McKee, "This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity."

Susan Trossman is the senior reporter for The American Nurse.

California RN bears Olympic torch

A California registered nurse was one of 11,500 torchbearers selected to carry the Olympic flame to Salt Lake City for the Winter Games.

Linda Houser, a nurse at the University of California -- Los Angeles Medical Center and a student at UCLA's School of Nursing's Acute Care Nurse Practitioner program, carried the torch down Main Street in Santa Maria before she handed it to the next person on the 13,500-mile relay effort.

Houser's sister, Karen, nominated her because of her dedication to nursing and determination to return to the profession and continue her education after suffering a back injury that required a year of recovery. Torchbearers were selected from a field of more than 200,000 nominations.

"I can't believe I was chosen for this honor," Houser said. "More than being an honor for me, though, I see it as an honor for the nursing profession."