MAY 2021 | 13
CELEBRATE NURSES
Schwallie Answered Calling
LEFT HOSPITAL FOR HOSPICE CONTRIBUTOR: Maria Kirkpatrick
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nd-of-life care is every bit as important as the beginning of life, and Reenie Schwallie wants to make sure her patients feel cared for and comfortable with the decisions they make. Schwallie is the admissions nurse at Lumina Hospice & Palliative Care in Corvallis, and has been taking care of others since 1978. A graduate of Loyola University in Chicago, Schwallie moved to Corvallis about 40 years ago when her husband took a job with Hewlett-Packard. The couple raised four children and have four grandchildren. “Nursing is a wonderful career,” she said. “I went into it because I liked science and helping people.” She has worked at Lumina Hospice, formerly named Benton Hospice Service, since 2003. The name was changed because it serves five different counties. “It was a long journey to get here,” Schwallie said. “I had worked in a hospital, but always wanted to work with patients and their families in a home setting. I help people deal with the end of life. Like birth, death is important to family life.” As a hospital nurse, she saw people die alone, without their pets, family and comfort of home. Hospice care, she said, was her calling. She began working in hospice part time while raising her children. Eventually, she became a case manager and then a manager. Now she is the admitting nurse and the first point of contact for patients.
“It’s a tough time,” she said of the stage in life when people make final plans. “It’s a crucial point in life. So many people are ready to embrace comfort care at home rather than pursue more aggressive treatment. By the time they get to me, they are so grateful to hear about the care hospice provides.” “People have so many ideas of what hospice is,” Schwallie said. “It truly is all about comfort care and all about the quality of life, not the quantity. We don’t make choices for (patients); we support and educate them to make choices for themselves.” The day-today diversity of the job is what Schwallie likes the most. She said everyone is different, and she gets to meet all sorts of people from all walks of life. “No day is like the other,” she said. The biggest challenge she has faced in the profession is happening now. In this time of COVID-19, Schwallie said it is very difficult to wear double masks and face shields and still connect with people. It’s been a huge challenge to communicate with all these barriers. Through it all, Schwallie said it is important to pay attention to self-care. She said she is lucky to have a wonderful team of coworkers who support each other through the tough cases and these frustrating times. Away from work, Schwallie is an outdoors person. She skis and climbs mountains as an outlet and to maintain balance in her life. “I feel very blessed to be a part of Lumina and make a positive difference in people’s lives,” she said. “The isolation people are suffering at this time is as awful as the pandemic.”
“Nursing is a wonderful career,” she said. “I went into it because I liked science and helping people.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Kelly Lyons
