Sarah was checking her last message from one of her patients and proceeded to ask if we had ever heard about hiccups being a sign of a heart attack. My other co-worker and I giggled a little due to the nature of the question, and let's be honest, we have never heard that hiccups were associated with a heart attack. We soon realized that Sarah was deeply concerned with the message, and in typical fashion, she proceeded to ask the fellow if he had ever heard of the relation between hiccups and heart disease. The fellow was not sure and was unable to answer her concerns. For most nurses, this would have been the end of the matter, and they would have moved on, but not for Sarah. By the time I had left the office to help a patient and returned, Sarah said she had googled hiccups and heart attacks, and it said that some people do experience this symptom when having a myocardial infarction.

Sarah dialed the patient's number and tried to gather more information from the patient. The patient reported having some chest discomfort in the morning and some chest pressure, but at that time, he was only experiencing the hiccups, and it wasn't going away. It was almost time to go home, but Sarah's "Spidey" sense took over and directed the patient to come in for an EKG to ensure that he was not in any danger. Luckily, the patient resided near the hospital and agreed to come in. Sarah was aware that it was the end of the day and decided that she would do the EKG to avoid holding people back. The patient arrived, and the EKG was done, and lo and behold, the patient was having an acute MI. The RRT team was activated, and the patient was sent to the ER for further testing and management. Sarah's intuition and passion for her profession potentially saved this patient's life.

Sarah is an exceptional leader, advocate, teacher, and mentor, and she works tirelessly to bring about change to our department and improve the care for our patients. She is caring, compassionate, and devoted to providing quality and compassionate care to our patients. This particular story is not the exception, it is the norm for Sarah day in and day out, she is always making sure that every patient is being taken care of. This patient was lucky to have someone like Sarah taking care of him. For the rest of us, we heard hiccups and that was the end of the story, but for Sarah, it was an opportunity to learn, and in doing so, she taught us an invaluable lesson: to listen to the little voice inside your head or pay attention to your gut feeling and do something about it. Sarah did something about it and saved a patient's life.