Good Samaritan’s Nurse of the Year ‘shocked’ to receive honor


Yvette Rodriguez was “completely surprised” to be named Advocate Aurora Health Nurse of the Year at Good Samaritan Hospital.

“My parents and my husband were there when I got the award. I was so shocked,” Rodriguez, 30, of Addison, said.

She is one of the 750 nurses who work at Good Samaritan. A nurse of the year was named at each of Advocate Aurora Health’s 30 hospitals.

The Nurse of the Year receives a trophy “and an awesome parking spot,” Rodriguez said.

Rodriguez has worked in the Advocate system for seven years, the past five at Good Samaritan in Downers Grove where she is a lead cardiovascular and critical care nurse.

Her career began with two years at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, working in the intensive care unit.

“We have such an amazing team in the ICU [at Good Samaritan] and, quite frankly, any one of the nurses is deserving of this award,” she said.

Rodriguez chose a career in nursing because she enjoys helping others.

“I’m the daughter of immigrant parents, so I was frequently the child brought to do translation for my family whenever they went to doctor appointments of if anyone was hospitalized,” she said.

“They’d bring me along and I started seeing the compassion nurses have,” Rodriguez said. “I saw how vulnerable my family was and how compassionate, how respectful, how kind [the nurses] were.

“It gave me that urge to study and work in a field where I could give back that same feeling of comfort when [people] are most vulnerable,” she said.

Rodriguez finds it rewarding to help a patient regain good health, along with learning “things about someone that you probably would not have encountered otherwise.”

When she worked in Oak Lawn, she began helping more cardiac patients. That interest grew when she joined the nursing staff at Good Samaritan.

“It takes a lot of fine detail and attention to everything to take care of these patients when they come out of surgery and they’re so critical,” she said. “Something can be going fine one minute and the next minute you find yourself in a very critical situation. I like constantly paying attention to what’s going on.”

Her skill and attention to detail was not lost on Ruth Ann Nichols-Walker, another nurse in the CCU who nominated Rodriguez for the award.

Her superiors also appreciate Rodriguez’ work ethic.

“Yvette is a talented nurse, a thoughtful leader and consistently shows her compassion in and out of the hospital.”said Roseanne Niese, chief nursing officer at Good Samaritan.

“Her leadership, calm demeanor and expertise are an asset during emergent situations in a Level I trauma unit,” Niese continued. “I’m thrilled we can recognize her in this way.”

Connie Nolan, manager of the critical care unit at Good Samaritan, said Rodriguez “does it all.”

And, like other nurses, she’s done it all while dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It’s been a roller coaster ride, to say the least,” Rodriguez said.

“It’s been an emotional burden on nurses, especially the restrictions on family members, not having them there with their loved ones at a time when you need to rely on your family,” she said. “That’s been one of the hardest things. It’s been rough.”

Besides working at the hospital, Rodriguez soon will complete her work on a Doctor of Nursing Practice degree, adding to her level of expertise.

“She’s a lifelong learner,” Niese said. “She’s wonderful at what she does.”

Nominations were submitted by clinicians and team members and reviewed by peer committees for blind judging according to each nominee’s passion for patient care, commitment to service, solution-oriented abilities and evidence-based practice, according to a news release.

Advocate Aurora Health employs more than 22,000 nurses across the system’s 26 acute care facilities and more than 500 sites of care, according to the release.