This fall marks seven years of working at Mercy LIFE Valley View. This has been one of the most unique jobs that I have had in my 35+ year career! Since all the participants and a good number of colleagues at Valley View are Deaf, I immediately felt the importance of learning American Sign Language (ASL) in order to communicate with them in their heart language. I have learned ASL primarily by being immersed in this community as well as studying flashcards and using online resources at home. I am not completely fluent in ASL but have a pretty good grasp of ASL at the conversational level. We have ASL interpreters available, and I do use interpreters for meetings, interviews, etc., but it is so rewarding to be able to have conversations with my Deaf colleagues, or brag about my grandchildren in ASL to the elderly ladies living at Valley View (who by the way really enjoy to see pictures of everyone's babies and grandbabies)! What a special place Valley View is, and I'm proud to work here!

I am writing this on behalf of my husband, Claude. He has been a participant at Trinity Health PACE Pensacola for two weeks. He has been enjoying spending the day there. It has gotten him out and socializing. The staff are wonderful in talking to him and learning and understanding his needs. They have him participate in the activities as much as he can, which is awesome. The physical therapy and occupational therapy is working for him already. He is starting to do things he hasn’t been able to do very well or at all since he had his stroke 3 1/2 years ago. He gets excited every morning when it’s time for us to get him ready to go. And he gets sad on the weekends when he can’t go! Even though it’s only been 2 weeks, this program has already been a huge blessing for him. And having been his primary caretaker for the past 3 1/2 years, it has also been a huge help for me and our children. They really have an amazing understanding of caregiver burn out and they help with that as well. This program is a faith based, family oriented, patient centered program. And we are so blessed beyond words for this program and what is going to do for my husband! Thank you, THOP (Trinity Health PACE of Pensacola) for being all about care and support!

I sincerely appreciate the extremely caring team I am part of and how we meet every morning regarding our participants. As a newer colleague, I am so grateful for the warm welcome I have received from every single colleague here at Mercy LIFE. The security guards always offer a friendly morning greeting, the nursing staff is always available and ready to help when I have questions, and the dietitian and other colleagues are always bringing treats to meetings (as a foodie, this is wonderful!). My training and orientation experience was thorough and presented with humor. The social workers, the kitchen staff, transportation, chaplain, rehab therapy staff, home care workers – everyone is so great. I truly believe the people I work with make this job worthwhile. There is a positive and upbeat culture at our center, and I have loved joining this group.

My first introduction to Mercy Life of Massachusetts was in 2015, as I would follow one of the vans on my way to work. I learned more about PACE programs in the next year or so, and decided that when the time was right, I wanted to work in a PACE program. I was hired as a clinic RN in October of 2017, and grew a lot as a nurse and a caregiver as I learned the model of care and all that we can offer our participants to keep them living in the community. We don’t just care for our participants, we serve them in the Spirit of the Gospel, which is the same Spirit that Jesus served in when he walked this earth and sought out to seek and save the most vulnerable.

I became RN case manager in 2020 and have had the opportunity to serve our participants and my colleagues during the pandemic. That was a difficult period of time during which we lost participants to COVID-19, and colleagues to other job opportunities. I chose to stay the course and am pleased to see that our program has grown as we bring on new colleagues and work to provide optimal service to our participants. We have an amazing team and I feel privileged to be a part of it.