3515 Silverside Road
Wilmington, DE 19810
RELEASE DATE: October 10, 2006 For Immediate Release
CONTACT: Beverly Crowl
Tel: 302-478-5707 x143; 302-547-1816
Email: bcrowl@delawarehospice.org
In Tribute to Terri, a Delaware Hospice On-Call Nurse
(and in Recognition of the Contributions of all Hospice Nurses)
On September 8, the Delaware Hospice community was devastated to learn of the tragic death of an On-Call Nurse, Teresa Vasquez. After responding to a family’s call for help in a crisis situation, Teresa was driving home at 3:30 a.m. when she was struck head-on by a car in the wrong lane and killed instantly. Shocking and sad in any case, the loss of Teresa was particularly tough as she was loved by all who knew her and special in so many ways.
Teresa Vasquez was a surprise. No one believed that her 46-year old mother of five children, with the youngest already 12 years old, was pregnant. Living in Chester, Pennsylvania, where the neighborhood was a close community, the baby shower for Teresa was huge.
As the baby, Terri was naturally a bit spoiled by her older siblings. Her sister-in-law, Ginger, recalled, “Terri hated grade school and her older brothers had to take turns ushering her to school.” Perhaps it was because of her special position in the family, but her brother Rick said, “Although the rest of us were quite shy, Terri talked all the time and always laughed and joked around.” Years later, Terri became the one who phoned everyone in the family regularly and organized the parties. She chose to work Monday through Thursday so she could travel to the family barbecues and celebrations. Rick said, “If she couldn’t be here, we couldn’t have it.”
Terri was courageous. At nine years of age, Terri was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes and thus began her daily regimen of insulin injections and blood tests twice a day. “We have no idea where the disease came from as no one else in the family ever had it,” Rick said, “but Terri never complained. She would whine about silly things like a headache or a cold or a stubbed toe, but I never heard a word of complaint about her diabetes.”
With her illness, Terri was exposed to healthcare quite intensively, and might have been influenced by two nurses in the family as well, but whatever the motivating factor, she chose nursing as a career. She initially took a job as a nurse’s aide for three months, then she attended Delaware County Community College, earned her Licensed Practical Nurse Degree, and finally returned and graduated as a Registered Nurse.
Terri gained experience in several nursing specialties, but primarily trained as an oncology nurse at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia and at the Georgetown Lombardi Center for Oncology. When her father entered a hospice program in Delaware County, she learned about the hospice philosophy of care and went to work with them for some time as well.
Terri was selfless. When Terri’s older sister Marie was diagnosed with breast cancer, Terri left her job in Georgetown and stayed at home for two years to take care of her sister, who coincidentally died on Terri’s birthday.
By 1998, Terri was not well, herself. Her health had started to deteriorate, and she went on dialysis. Rick said, “I volunteered to give her a kidney and passed all my tests but the last; my glucose tolerance test was unacceptable. Her doctor said not to worry, that we’d find something. Two weeks later, he called and told her to come in to Temple Hospital. A young man had been killed in a traffic accident and they had a kidney and pancreas for her.”
Terri was confident and peaceful as she faced the 12-hour operation, telling her anxious family, “Don’t worry about me, this is going to be much better than dialysis whatever the outcome.” The next day, and after 28 years of daily insulin and blood tests, Terri was no longer a diabetic. She was free of the life-threatening disease!
Terri was in love with the beach areas of Delaware and bought a house in Lewes where she vacationed for many years and ultimately chose to live. Upon relocating to the area, Terri was thrilled to discover a job at Delaware Hospice. Rick said, “She loved that job. She was happier in the last three months than she had been since the death of her older sister. She felt she had found something worthwhile that fit her skills.”
Terri became an On-Call Nurse for Delaware Hospice. “Our nurses serve ‘on-call’ and ‘back-up on-call’,” Team Leader Patti Winward said. “The primary nurse is on-call, but if multiple numbers of patients require visits, she can ask for help from her backup nurse. While on duty, they take care of concerns from families that come in from 4:30 p.m. to 8 a.m., and will either address it on the phone or go to visit the patient.” She added, “and to cover all of Sussex County, we’re talking about some potentially long drives.”
“On-call nurses’ reports are due by 8 a.m.,” Patti further explained, “whereby they report on the night’s activities so that the primary nurses are aware that the on-call nurse was utilized, that this was the concern, and that they should follow-up with a call or visit to make sure things are okay with that family. Sometimes calls are for simple questions like, “What dose of medicine should be given?” It may not require a visit, but the on-call nurse will carefully examine the patient’s record, review it, and may ask the caregiver to spell the name of the medicine, giving reassurance that they’re administering the correct medicine and the right amount.”
Terri was perfect for Delaware Hospice. Claire Walsh, her Team Leader, said, “Terri fell right into this job. Her orientation went well, she went straight out to on-call duty, and she never had problems. And that’s not easy. You’re really on your own with major decisions to make, and you must have a good dose of common sense.”
“Terri was full of joy,” Claire noted. “It could be 10 a.m. and she would be bringing her paperwork in after being on-call all night, and she’d be bouncing along, smiling and happy. She was just a happy person who made an impact on everyone she came in contact with.
Professionally, Terri was a pillar of support to her colleagues. Registered Nurse, Lynn Van Pelt, worked with her closely: “Terri was on-call through the week and I was on-call every other weekend. We would back each other up with the help of a third nurse, Dawn Sonntag. Terri helped me to change my focus from curative to pain management. We worked so well together, consulting and exchanging ideas. Even though one of us was assigned nights and one was assigned days, we always reported to each other and shared responsibility and decisions. We lived in different areas of the county and worked effectively as a team, determining which of us was closest or who had the expertise for that situation.”
Dawn Sonntag, R.N., remembers, “She went above and beyond one weekend day when I was ill and exhausted with a fever. She wouldn’t hear of anything but my going home to rest and letting her take over. She was wonderful and kind. Terri also volunteered to work holidays so others could be with their families. She was quite expert in hospice care and always happy to answer my questions.”
Lynn added, “When I first started, she advised me what things to have ready to take to a patient’s home and insisted that I always be prepared. She had worked on-call for a hospice in Philadelphia and had experience going out in the middle of the night.
“On one occasion,” Lynn remembered, “a patient who lived near Terri but quite a distance from me had become quite agitated earlier in the day. I tried to call to check on him, but there was no answer. Although I was on duty and Terri was off, I called to express my concern and asked her to drop by to see if the patient was okay. She cheerfully agreed and called later to assure me that he was fine and I could put that off my list of worries.”
Terri was an educator. One of her interests was patient training and one of her goals was to create teaching tools for patients to have in the house for some issues that might come up such as learning to use the CADD pump, an infusion device for pain medication.
At the age of 45, after a brief three months at Delaware Hospice, Terri’s life was brought to an end when, returning from a patient visit in the early hours of the morning, her car was struck head-on by a driver who was on the wrong side of the road. Ironically, Terri’s life, once saved by a fatal accident, was now lost in another.
Everyone who knew her had “why” questions, such as her brother Rick, who wondered, “Why, when she would lose her keys nearly every time she got in the car, couldn’t she have lost her keys for five minutes that night?”
In a “Eulogy for Aunt Terri” her niece, Nancy Vasquez, chose to remember special moments: “There are memories of happy times—when my mom got to cap Terri as she became a Registered Nurse, all the barbecues, Thanksgivings and Christmases. Those are things that no accident can take away from us. We will never understand why God chose to take her like He did, but we can let our hearts be happy, not angry, at the life lived.”
Anyone inspired by Terri Vasquez’s story can honor her memory through a donation to the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation, 225 City Ave., Suite 104, Bala Cynwyd, PA 19004 or by joining an organ donor program.
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About Delaware Hospice
Since 1982, Delaware Hospice has provided exceptional care and support to nearly 23,000 patients and their families. Its mission is to help each patient, each day, live the fullest, most comfortable life possible. Delaware Hospice is the largest and only licensed, nonprofit, community-based hospice serving New Castle, Kent and Sussex counties in Delaware and southern Chester and Delaware counties in Pennsylvania. For more information about Delaware Hospice and our specialized programs, call 800-838-9800 or visit our website, www.delawarehospice.org.
Delaware Hospice is accredited by JCAHO. Read Statement
