Tecla Lin & Nelia Laroza Memorial Award

I have been a Registered Nurse in the Philippines since 2007. I worked in a tertiary hospital for 8 years and was assigned to various units such as medical-surgical, pediatrics, and operating room. My favorite unit that I have worked in was the operating room, I felt during that time that this would be my career until I retire. I arrived in Canada last 2016 and first settled in Surrey, BC and moved to Edmonton, AB a year after.

Currently, I am a Licensed Practical Nurse in Alberta and work as an operating room nurse in one of the hospitals in Edmonton. Before working in the operating room, I finished my Perioperative Course at MacEwan University, Edmonton last 2019. I feel grateful because my goal to continue my career as an OR nurse has been met and will hopefully prosper into becoming an RN after finishing my bridging course that I am currently taking up at Mount Royal University in Calgary, AB. The course started last January of this year and I am hoping to finish it by early next year. Being an International Educated Nurse (IEN), I was so lucky that I got accepted in this program after submitting all of the requirements. It is an opportunity for me to learn more about the health care system in this beautiful country, Canada. Having said that, my aspirations in my career as a nurse will help me achieve such through this course.

During the start of the pandemic, I was redeployed to different units because all surgeries were cancelled. Unfortunately, I got COVID during that time but luckily survived with mild symptoms only. I witnessed how tired the health workers in those units were, especially in ICU. Also, the pain that the patients were suffering as well as the family. For more than a year that I was reassigned, I realized that my duty as a nurse will never stop and has no limits in caring for sick patients, even during a pandemic.