Companions in Care, Companions in Life: A CHOC Love Story – CHOC

He was working the night time shift as an assistant on CHOC’s neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).

She was a brand new nursing resident on the ground.

“I believed he was so dreamy,” Kristin recollects.

Kristin, too, had caught David’s eye. However he hadn’t discovered a strategy to break the ice with informal chit chat.

One night time, Kristin walked as much as David.

“Do you may have a stapler?”

Flustered, he answered, “It’s over there,” his eyes avoiding her gaze.

And so was born a love story that culminated, two years later, with the wedding of Kristin and David Fischer.

Now wed for 14 years, they’re the dad and mom of dual sons Noah and Cole, 11, and daughter Kennedy, 4.

Extremely regarded 

As we speak, Kristin is the nursing director of the NICU and David is a cost nurse within the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU).

Kristin oversees all three NICU items on the hospital, managing a workforce of 350 nurses who take care of sufferers throughout 104 beds in Orange.

David cares for older sufferers with all kinds of diagnoses and is concerned with medical, surgical procedure, and trauma packages on a number of flooring.

Each are extremely revered and admired by their colleagues.

“Collectively they aren’t solely superb associates and leaders at CHOC however are elevating a fantastic household,” says Nancy Kraus, govt director of important care who has labored carefully with the 2.

“Kristin is an incredible chief who strives to be linked to all of the members of the NICU nursing and multidisciplinary workforce,” Nancy provides. “She leads many essential hospital initiatives and is a superb position mannequin for the leaders on her workforce.”

David will get related excessive remarks. Dr. Jason Knight, medical director of the PICU, has been working carefully with him for a decade.

“He’s at all times been and continues to be one of the crucial hard-working and devoted nurses, each on the bedside and as a cost nurse and trauma code nurse,” Dr. Knight says. “From a medical standpoint, he at all times shows distinctive judgment, supplies wonderful affected person care, and works extraordinarily arduous to help the important care physicians, nurses, and respiratory therapists.

“From an administrative and triage standpoint, I’ve the utmost confidence in David’s talents and know that each one PICU sufferers will obtain wonderful care in a well timed method. He has a optimistic angle and a very good humorousness, enabling him to collaborate effectively with physicians, nurses, and respiratory therapists with a view to coordinate affected person care.”

The mother-in-law connection

Kristin didn’t realize it on the time, however one of many managers who interviewed her for the residency program after she graduated from nursing college at California State College, Lengthy Seaside was David’s mom, Marie. It was August 2008, and Marie was a nursing supervisor of the CHOC NICU.

“She demonstrated professionalism and her solutions to the behavioral state of affairs interview questions impressed me,” Marie recollects.

When he met Kristin, David hadn’t but selected a profession in nursing after accidents had ended his pursuit as an expert baseball participant. He was contemplating medical machine gross sales.

After graduating from California State College, Fullerton, with a level in communications advertising and marketing and promoting, he served as an intern in CHOC’s advertising and marketing and communications division earlier than becoming a member of the NICU as a unit assistant.

When Kristin was three-months pregnant with their twins, David discovered he was accepted into nursing college. He graduated in 2014 with Kristin turning into nurse supervisor of the NICU the next 12 months. She’s been the director since 2022.

Advantages of working collectively

Like many {couples} in healthcare, Kristin and David discover that talking the identical “workplace language” has its perks.

“It’s nice that we work collectively within the medical discipline, as a result of I can come residence and speak to her about my shift, and he or she will get it – and vice versa,” David says.

“We will sympathize with one another extra,” Kristin provides.

Their shared expertise goes past being nurses; as former NICU dad and mom, Kristin and David have a deep understanding of what households undergo. Their sons, Noah and Cole, had been born six weeks untimely and frolicked within the NICU, giving them firsthand expertise of the challenges many dad and mom face.

“I get pleasure from speaking to sufferers and serving to information dad and mom by means of the method,” David says. “Plenty of dad and mom really feel helpless, however I inform them, ‘Hey, I went by means of this, too.”

Not only a job

Outdoors of CHOC, David coaches his sons’ Little League baseball workforce and the Fischers love doing issues collectively as a household.

They make annual visits to Hawaii to go to Kristin’s sister and luxuriate in household dance battles, S’extra nights, and pool days at residence.

Each can’t think about working wherever else than CHOC.

“It’s the individuals,” David says.

“And the prime quality of care we offer,” Kristin provides.

“CHOC practices household values,” David says, “and the managers and leaders actually encourage you to develop right here, and so they assist you.” Kristin has graduate levels in nursing and enterprise administration. David plans to pursue a grasp’s diploma in nursing management.

Provides Kristin: “We don’t really feel we’re going to work however as a substitute doing one thing we love.”

Marie says it’s been a pleasure to witness the love between David and Kristin develop through the years.

“They work as a workforce supporting each other of their pursuit of development and improvement,” Marie says. “I proceed to be amazed how the legacy of CHOC has impacted our household.”