KELLY BROWN

With 35 years nursing, she’s made big impact in short period of time

Mary Pieper

For the Globe Gazette

Kelly Brown, the health care coordinator at Country Meadow Place, has only been there for a few months, but has already made a big impact.

Tyler Hedegard, community relations manager at the Mason City assisted living, memory care and respite care community,called her a“resident-first nurse” who truly cares about people and“handles everything in the most professional way possible.(She) makes sure all staff feel like a team.”

Brown,an RN,has been a nurse for more than 35 years. She said working with residents who have dementia or Alzheimer’s is rewarding because she can“be there for them and keep them safe and make sure that they get hugs. They love to hug, most of them.”

She also loves being there for their families.

“It’s so hard for the families when their loved ones are given this diagnosis and they can’t take care of them,” Brown said. The family members are grateful for the care their loved ones receive,according to Brown.

Brown received her CNA and LPN from North Iowa Area Community College and did her clinicals at MercyOne North Iowa Medical Center. She then moved to Colorado, finished her education there, and remained there as a nurse. She returned to North Iowa 16 years ago.

During her career, Brown has worked in cardiovascular care and been an ER nurse. She also spent some time as a hospice nurse, which she loved.

“It’s such a wonderful Medicare benefit for the transition into end of life,”she said. “I just kind of stayed in the geriatric care for this part of my career.”

Brown went from a hospice setting to assisted living at a time when it was starting to “really catch on as an option for families and their loved ones instead of a nursing home (because) they can have an apartment and stuff like that,”she said.

Brown said her advice to nurses who

Country Meadow Place

are just beginning their careers is to

“find what you love and specialize in it.

Don’t stay somewhere just because it’s a good-paying job. There’s so many different areas of nursing that if you find what you love and what you excel at, it’s just very satisfying and for your patients,your residents, yourself, your family, just find what you love to do and be the best at it.”

NURSES: THE HEART OF HEALTH CARE