18 Jan 2018 Walking the walk: Faith leads RN to become role model nurse

by John Patton

Lisa Speer, RN, is the kind of nurse that women hope for when they are preparing to deliver a baby.

She is there to give her anxious patients a gentle, encouraging word or touch during the most joyous or scariest of times. Lisa writes a note of encouragement for them to take home after their experience in the Conway Regional Women’s Center. “Being a part of one of the most amazing events in a family’s life, welcoming a new little one into their world, is my favorite part of the job,” Speer said. “It’s truly a bonding experience!” 

In some instances, Lisa becomes a lifelong friend to her patients.

“She was amazing, humble, and words cannot describe the compassion she shows,” wrote a patient who nominated Speer for Conway Regional’s top nursing award last fall.

Nursing is an extension of her faith that neatly fits in with other aspects of her life devoted to God, along with serving as the nurse manager at Life Choices of Conway and at Central Baptist Church, where she and her husband, Jason, have been involved for 20 years. At the church, Lisa sings in the choir, works in the children’s ministry, has served on mission trips to the Dominican Republic and Guatemala and records the weekly video announcements. “I love my church family, and I’m so thankful for the refueling and renewing that I experience there, to be able to go out into a sometimes dark world with hope and joy,” said Speer. 

One of her favorite scriptures is Matthew 5:14: “You are the light of the world.” Lisa interprets the scripture to mean “your world is your sphere of influence. As a Christian in the workplace, I am called to be a light to my co-workers as well as my patients and their families.” 

“She walks the walk,” said co-worker Deborah Crow, RN.

The walk is not easy. Despite the best of efforts, there is not always a happy ending in Labor and Delivery. She understands what it is like to lose a baby. Lisa wears a tiny anchor symbol attached to a necklace around her neck in remembrance of three babies lost to miscarriage. “It reminds me that our only hope is in the Lord,” said Speer. “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure (Hebrews 6:19).”

Lisa helps patients cope with the loss of a baby through Conway Regional’s Perinatal Bereavement Program, which includes a free monthly support group as well as preparing items for memory books. “It’s always an emotional time when we lose a baby,” said Speer. “We are there to walk through it with them.”

In those times, she relies on the support of her work and home family. During one of those dark times, her pastor, Don Chandler, encouraged her to focus on a “Life Verse.”

“The verse that I feel reflects my purpose in this life is Psalms 139:14, where David is praising God ‘for I am fearfully and wonderfully made,’” Speer said. “My calling is to celebrate the beautiful creation of life.” 

As part of her efforts to live out that scripture, Lisa serves at Life Choices, a non-profit organization that helps women with unplanned pregnancies where she performs free ultrasounds under the direction of Debra Lawrence, MD, the organization’s medical director, for women who are considering abortion or those without insurance during the early stage of pregnancy. 

“I enjoy helping them acknowledge that a baby is a baby regardless of the age,” said Speer. As the pregnancy moves forward, she has helped many of those patients deliver their babies at Conway Regional. “It is so amazing to be able to get to start with a client at Life Choices, to be able to show them their baby on the ultrasound screen, in some cases helping them to choose life for their child, then being able to walk through their labor and delivery at Conway Regional.” 

Lisa’s walk has not gone unnoticed by patients, families or co-workers. Valerie Lambe, RN, added, “I think she has the purest heart you will ever see.”

Lisa is a 12-year Labor and Delivery nurse in the Conway Regional Women’s Center who received just about every nursing award that was given by various organizations, boards and colleagues throughout the state in 2017. She is one of eight nurses with Conway Regional to be named to the Arkansas Center for Nursing’s 40 Nurse Leaders Under 40 program. The program honors emerging nurse leaders in the state who are under 40 years of age. She is also one of four registered nurses with Conway Regional to be selected for the statewide Great 100 Nurses recognition. This year, Lisa was awarded Conway Regional’s Exceptional Performer and was designated as a RN Clinician IV as part of the new Clinical Advancement Ladder for Conway Regional staff. She is also a winner of Conway Regional’s DAISY Award, which recognizes nurses who provide exemplary care.

“I am extremely proud of the work Lisa does in our Labor and Delivery department,” said Angie Longing, RN, chief nursing officer at Conway Regional. “I have received numerous accolades from many of her patients. The excellent care that she provides, the compassion that she shows her patients and co-workers sets a tremendous example for our nursing staff in Labor and Delivery and throughout the health system.”

Lisa is very thankful for the support, love and recognition that she has received from Conway Regional this year. “I am so far from perfect, and I am humbled and incredibly grateful for the awards I have been given. I hope to use the opportunities that I have been given to help others to shine in the upcoming year. We have an incredible staff of nurses, doctors, scrub techs and leadership that work so hard each day to make each family’s experience at Conway Regional to be the best it can be. It takes all of us working together as a team.” 

While the humble Speer is not perfect, it would be difficult to find anyone who has seen her lose her temper or be anything but gentle and kind even during the most trying of circumstances.

“Even when things are burning down, she still has the best attitude,” said Deborah Crow, RN.

“Sometimes it is the scariest times that bond you together,” said Speer. She recalled a busy morning when she was preparing to be the charge nurse on the shift in Labor and Delivery. That morning she helped deliver a healthy baby to one of her now lifelong friends, but things turned grim when the patient began to hemorrhage. After an emergency hysterectomy, 14 units of blood, a stay in the Critical Care Unit and inspiring team effort by physicians, nurses and other Conway Regional staff, her friend was reunited with her family. “There’s no way we could do what we do without a great team behind us,” says Speer. “Our work family truly is family.”

A native of Beebe, Speer realized she wanted to be involved in the care of babies as a small child when her parents, Larry and Barbara Dugger, took her to the nursery to look at babies during hospital visits. “As I looked through the nursery window and watched the workers holding the babies, I was amazed that those ladies had a job holding babies. I knew back then that I wanted to work with babies.” 

While in high school, she decided she wanted to become an ultrasound tech so she could perform pregnancy ultrasounds. While attending classes at Central Baptist College and working at Baptist Health in North Little Rock, she realized that nursing was her career path. Now, she has the opportunity to do both, ultrasounds and nursing through Life Choices and Conway Regional. 

Lisa met her husband, Jason, at CBC while achieving her associate’s degree. “Jason is my better half. He supports me in everything I do and is always my biggest fan. I couldn’t do what I do without him.” They were married in 2001, and she graduated from the University of Central Arkansas with a bachelor of science degree in nursing in 2004. They have two sons, Brayden (12) and Dylan (9). 

It was actually delivering her first son, Brayden, and the excellent care she received from now co-worker, Gwen Rigsby, RN, that helped Speer decide that Conway Regional was where she wanted to start her career as a Labor and Delivery nurse. “There are so many nurses that have impacted me during my career.” 

A moment that she will always remember came for Lisa while she was completing her UCA clinical training at Conway Regional when she met Sarah Duck, RN, a future co-worker. “She was a real Labor and Delivery nurse, and I wanted to be like her when I grew up.” Lisa joined the Labor and Delivery department at Conway Regional a year after graduation.

Twelve years later, many young nurses and students want to be like Lisa Speer.