Page 30 - University of Martland Nursing Forum - Winter 2017

the two institutions have a “very close relationship,” she says. “One of the draws of this place is the ability to have professional service agreements, which allow faculty to continue to practice. ... It’s convenient, and we’ve got a nice partnership.”
The benefits of that partnership go both ways and along multiple paths. Davenport’s classes and curricula naturally reflect her real-world experiences—working with a patient with severe liver disease awaiting a transplant, for instance, or a lung-transplant patient who has returned to the hospital with critical complications from the flu. “I can be in the MICU caring for a patient or rounding with the multidisciplinary team and I’ll learn something new or see a new way of thinking about a clinical problem and be able to take that information back to the School and put it into action,” she says.
Conversely, she often finds her MICU work benefiting from new information and approaches she’s exposed to on the academic side, such as a recent protocol shift for the care of severe infections, or sepsis. “New guidelines came out last year to address the care of these patients,” Davenport says. “I took that information and updated my notes for class. Within a couple of days, I was in the
hospital caring for a patient with sepsis and was able to put into practice my new knowledge.”
Davenport’s students also benefit from her MICU shifts, gaining hands-on experience in the fast-paced and challenging critical-care environment.
“I often have students with me getting some clinical time, working with me as I take care of patients,” she says. “Just recently,
I had a student with me until 7:30 [p.m.]. She was with me for 12 hours. Working with critically ill patients was brand new to her, so I stuck by her side for the whole shift. Then
I stayed an extra two hours to finish up what I couldn’t get to while I was working with the student. ... Making sure the students have an opportunity to experience the nursing care required for patients as sick as those
in the MICU is important. I never want to minimize the intensity and wrongly convince a student that it is just another day. Rather,
I want them to understand that the intensity is a part of this kind of nursing, and the rewards are different than those they may look for in other types of nursing.”
After leaving the MICU on Thursday night, Davenport transitions back to her teaching role at UMSON on Friday. And
the nonstop pace of her work doesn’t go unnoticed; sometimes, the people she’s closest to give her a hard time for the intense schedule. “I’m given some good-natured teasing by my colleagues and my family because I’m in charge of the assignments as vice chair of the department, and for some reason I keep assigning myself a Monday morning and a Friday afternoon class,” she says. “It upsets the people who think I should have long weekends every once in a while.”
But the variety and interconnectivity
of it all, along with occasional cups of coffee, are enough to keep her going strong. “The various roles complement each other in such a way that I don’t feel overwhelmed by
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