2022 KPNAA Awards
& Holiday Dinner
2022 KPNAA Awards and Holiday Dinner
(Link WIll Open Google Photos Page)
Stories & Images
From The Frontline
Madhava Kantor, CRNA
Downey Medical Center
Photographer: Tuyen Lee, CRNA
Thank You Orange County Medical Center For Sharing PPE With the Downey Medical Center!
Dear Dr Newton,
The Anesthesiology Department at DMC would like to send you sincere gratitude. I hope you stay safe and take care. Thank you!
Anesthesiology Department
Anesthesiologists and CRNAs
Downey Medical Center (DMC)
Downey Medical Center KPNAA Members Lead Through Covid-19 Crisis, Management Thanks CRNAs
From: Debra J. Jones
Sent: Wednesday, April 22, 2020 4:27 PM
Re: Our Anesthesia Process for Stat Intubations and Intubations in the OR (including the process intubating in the procedure room) to share
Good Afternoon All,
I am very proud of our Downey Anesthesia team in the way they responded without reservation in developing a Stat Intubation Team and process for Covid-19. Audra Kennedy CRNA, has done an exemplary job by stepping up and leading our group every step of the way in this process. Having Audra as our point provider to the Stat Intubation Team along with Michael Morales, Lead Certified Anesthesia Tech, Jordyn Woods CRNA educating the staff in equipment, and Susan Kapana CRNA recreating and maintaining the CRNA and Anesthesia Tech schedule was the key to our success. Audra, Susan, Jordyn and Michael continues to make adjustments as the Covid-19 situation changes. Audra has gone above and beyond in assuring the entire Anesthesia team, Peri-op team, ICU team and command center are kept up to date in real time. Let your team do what they do best and be there to support them. I am so moved by our Downey Anesthesia group jumping right in from the very start of Covid-19 to assure our patient’s safety and staff safety!
Please see our process through Google that Audra is sharing with you below. She is also willing to help your team by answering questions. You can reach her at 562-657-7837.
Thank you for letting us share our successful processes with you,
Debbie Debra J. Jones, BSN, RN, RNC – OB
Director, Department of Anesthesiology
Southern California Permanente Medical Group – SCPMG
Downey Medical Center/Bellflower Surgery Center & Pain Block Center
Downey Best Practice – Anesthesia Process for Stat Intubations and Intubations in the OR
Downey Medical Center (DMC) CRNAS enjoying lunch provided by KPNAA to the DMC Anesthesia Care Team – 04-22-2020
Panorama City Medical Center KPNAA Members – CRNA Leaders!
CRNAs at Panorama City Medical Center played a vital role to ensure patients had the right care at the right time with the Panorama City intubation teams throughout the facility.
Pictured left to right:
Ernest Buccat RN
Roni Tolentino RN
James Hegesy CST
Art David RN
Kelly Murray MD
Paul Anamos CRNA
Samia Levasseur CRNA.
Kerrie Klein, CRNA
Area Representative Panorama City
Being a CRNA during the COVID-19 pandemic is both an honor and overwhelming mission. It is an honor to have the knowledge and expertise to help a patient struggling to breathe by placing a breathing tube. It is an honor to stand next to some of the most brilliant, dedicated, and brave colleagues. It is an honor to know we make a difference and we just may save some lives.
In an already stressful job, our families and friends routinely provide relief from the stress. We work for them. We look forward to that respite. COVID-19 has taken that from us. We are under the most stress we have ever experienced, and we cannot see our families or friends for fear of making them sick. This is so trying. Some of my colleagues have moved out of their homes to protect their families, and come home to an empty place after a long and trying shift on the intubation team. The ones who have chosen to stay home or do not have the option of moving out push their children away until they can feel they are “safely clean.” But we never feel clean. We have to reuse masks and carry them in paper bags… this goes against our training of using things only once to prevent cross contamination.
The physical effects are difficult as well. It’s hard to eat, we have chest pains, stomach pains, headaches, and trouble sleeping. It truly is this crushing feeling when you walk into the hospital with varying degrees of despair. Everyone is terrified, some are trying to distract, some provide comic relief, some go to the locker room and cry, some go over the little PPE we have find creative ways to reuse. We know that at around 1% of us as healthcare workers will go down (get critically ill or die… more will be carriers). I think that’s the hardest part for us. At least for me, because I look around and wonder who it will be.
But we try to focus and we know we have a job to do. And we have each other. We know what to do. And that helps me take a deep breath.
Panorama City CRNAs at Christmas Party – Loretta Vejar, Kerrie Klein, Sue Ahn, Liezle Arevalo, Blair Mostofi
Kerrie Klein, CRNA
Panorama City Medical Center