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NURSES
SATURDAY, MAY 3, 2025
THE NORTH PLATTE TELEGRAPH
SALUTE TO NURSES | SAVING LIVES ‘That’s why you keep going’
ICU nursing team takes care of each other through the hardest days, charge nurse says.
the wonderful things that she could do.” She then moved to Nebraska and enrolled in the University of Nebraska Medical College of Nursing at its campus in Norfolk. She decided to pack up once again and move to North Platte “sight unseen” because of its similar size to North Platte and her previous experience with a travel nurse who took an assignment in the area, “She said the facility was amazing, the doctors, the nurses, everybody was amazing,” McColley said. “And Norfolk was too far from home, so my husband got a job at the local police department and we moved. And we’re here nine years later.” Now, at 32, McColley is the “mom” of her unit, working as a charge nurse in the ICU. At 5:45 a.m. her day starts. She heads into work to get reports and start assessing her patients. “The fun thing about ICU nursing,” she said, “is that everything can be fine, and then it's not, and that keeps you very, very busy.” During her three or four 12-hour shifts a week, McColley said, some days you can work with all sorts of providers from every specialty. “You’re kind of the mom that coordinates all of the doctors and everybody together to make sure that those patients are getting the best care that they can, that things are getting communicated to them and especially their families too,” she said. McColley’s team of nurses are a “well-oiled unit,” she said. “I wouldn't have stayed
McColley and the nurses to fill in gaps for each other, recognizing their strengths and weaknesses to ensure the best outcomes for their patients. It also allows them to take care of one another, either through a bit of dark humor or just checking in. “Sometimes you have to laugh through all of the awful things that are happening,” McColley said. “My co-workers really help a lot. They can tell when one of us is emotionally drained from it, and they come over and take over, make sure you eat something. … Just a five-minute break will really change your whole day.” Though her co-workers come close, the best part of being a nurse is when she gets to see a miracle happen and a life is saved, she said. “We had this one girl, and we were all really, really worried. It was bad. But she came back a month later and thanked us all,” McColley said. “I don’t cry, it's not in my genetics to cry, but when she came back and thanked us all, you knew that’s why we worked our butts off that day. It was for her and she lived, and that’s why you keep going. That’s why it’s worth it.” When she’s not at work, she cares for her family’s “hobby ranch,” where she, her kids and her husband care for their miniature animals: four cows, two donkeys and three goats. “They’re like my little antidepressants,” she said. “They make me happy and my donkeys give the best cuddles.” Having that source of companionship and comfort outside of work helps, because nursing is “hard work, and you have to be willing to do the hard work.” Her advice to future nurses is to “always want to learn.” “It’s hard work, but it's worth it in the end,” she said. “There’s those patients, because I’ve got a few that stick in my head and I know I will remember them till the day I die. Those are the ones that remind you why you wanted to be a nurse again. “This job will beat you down, but those patients and their families will remind you what you did was good, and you changed somebody's life.”
By CAITLYN THOMAS caitlyn.thomas@lee.net A has been in North Platte. Originally from Denver, McColley first went into health care at 18 years old. She worked as a certified nurse’s assistant until 2014, at times working alongside her mom and “watching
team player, a leader and a second- generation nurse, Courtney McColley has given her all to Great Plains Health throughout the nine years she
her be a nurse and all of
in North Platte, far away from home, if it wasn’t for the nurses that I work with,” she said. “Everybody is wonderful. They work super well together and everybody’s willing to help in any way they can.” That close teamwork allows
Caitlyn Thomas photo AT LEFT: Courtney McColley, 32, an ICU charge nurse at Great Plains Health, has worked in health care since she was 18. For nine years she has served the community of North Platte, forming close bonds with her fellow nurses and working hard to care for the patients of GPH.
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