Patient Spotlight

December 14, 2023

Healing over the holidays: A nurse’s guide to spending the holidays at the hospital

There’s no place like the hospital for the holidays. And we don’t mean that in a good way. But here are some ways to make it better.

By Courtney Graetzer, RN
Lenny Leedy
December 12, 2023

Speed, collaboration key in saving patient in midst of a heart attack

Lenny Leedy was attending a law enforcement conference in Nashville when he started experiencing symptoms of a heart attack. Today, Leedy is thankful the friend who offered to drive him to the hospital said, “We’re going to Vanderbilt.”

By Matt Batcheldor
November 22, 2023

Gracie was with her mom and grandmother on a road trip. A medical emergency brought the Angel 7 ambulance to her rescue.

Angel 7 is the first pediatric transport team in Tennessee to offer extracorporeal membrane oxygenation — ECMO — for its patients. It was the difference in life and death.

By Jessica Pasley
October 12, 2023

The couple was staying in the hospital with a sick child. When the staff heard it was their anniversary, they arranged a special dinner with candlelight and flowers.

Jim and Jill Somerville ended up with an anniversary to remember — and a commemorative plaque

By Jessica Pasley
September 21, 2023

Two miracles, four years apart

Kelly Harden’s life was saved by a lung transplant. Exactly four years later, she was saved again with a kidney transplant.

By Matt Batcheldor
Justin Stehr, OTR, CHT, an occupational therapist with the Department of Plastic Surgery’s Division of Hand and Upper Extremity, works with Dawn Reed on neuromuscular re-education of her wrist extensors and grip strength. (photo Susan Urmy)
September 15, 2023

A year of teamwork restores patient’s arm after devastating accident

Hundreds of Vanderbilt Emergency Medicine, Trauma, Orthopaedic Surgery, Plastic Surgery and Occupational Therapy clinicians have played a role in saving and restoring the function of patient Dawn Reed’s right arm and hand after a utility terrain vehicle accident.

By Jill Clendening
September 1, 2023

Holding hands one more time: Compassion and collaboration allow couple to spend the most precious time together

Virginia and Tommy Stevens, both 91, have been married 69 years and this was the time they needed each other the most. Compassionate problem-solving by the Palliative Care Unit and the Trauma Intensive Care Unit teams brought the loving couple together one more time.
By Jill Clendening
June 26, 2023

 “Old fashioned texting”: patient and her caregivers chat via signs in windows

The clinic building faces the hospital building, and when Katy Rose was in the hospital, she began posting signs for her clinic nurse to see. It kind of grew from there.
By Jessica Pasley
May 4, 2023

That piano music coming from the chapel? It’s a 16-year-old patient at the baby grand

The first chance he got to leave his hospital room, Gabe Gingerich made his way to the keyboard
By Jessica Pasley
April 24, 2023

Kenneth Reynolds weighed 780 lbs., and his body was shutting down. Vanderbilt Weight Loss Center gave him back his life.

Coming up: going fishing with his grandchildren
By Jill Clendening
April 6, 2023

A mysterious heart ailment almost killed Kevin Moore. It took a Vanderbilt team to pull him through.

“I think Kevin’s story really shows that if you can get people through that early sick period with the best management, the patient can do very well.”
By Matt Batcheldor
January 12, 2023

Expandable prosthesis gives young patient more mobility

To treat the osteosarcoma in his left leg, Dominic Gamez, 7, and his family chose to have a magnetic expandable prosthesis implanted that can be manipulated to grow incrementally as the child grows.
By Nancy Humphrey
October 31, 2022

VUMC nurse Kendra Kilgore received a liver transplant as a teenager. Then her teenage daughter needed one, too.

Kendra's experince helped her daughter Carissa: "I was able to explain to her from a first-hand view what it was like, not as a nurse, but as someone who went through it."
By Jessica Pasley