Samantha Clark celebrates receiving the DAISY Award with colleagues at Good Samaritan Hospital.

GREENSBORO, Ga. — Samantha Clark, a registered nurse with St. Mary’s Good Samaritan Hospital, recently received St. Mary’s system-wide DAISY Award for nursing excellence.

“Sam definitely takes patient care to heart,” said Medical/Surgical Nurse Manager Kelly Gilliard. “She goes above and beyond to be sure her patients and families are well taken care of.  Sam is by far one of the best nurses I have worked with in my career, and she is the epitome of what a nurse should be.” 

Samantha’s nomination focused on the compassionate care she delivered not only to a patient in the final stages of life, but to the patient’ family, who were unable to visit in person. In addition to exceptional patient care, she went out of her way to facilitate phone calls and video visits that were tremendously important to the patient and family in his final days.

“Samantha gave the family peace in a time of great sadness,” said Good Samaritan Director of Nursing Kimberly Tyler. “Her compassionate care will live in their hearts for a very long time. We are fortunate to have her on our team at Good Samaritan.”

Samantha, a registered nurse since 2017, joined the staff at Good Samaritan Hospital in August 2019 after she and her family moved to Georgia from Kansas. She lives in Lexington, Ga., has three sons, and loves the outdoors and family time. Kim noted that Samantha always steps up when needed and has served as a charge nurse and a COVID-19 nurse leader during her tenure with Good Samaritan.

The DAISY Award is an international recognition program that honors and celebrates the skillful, compassionate care nurses provide every day. Inspired by the care delivered to a dying young man, the DAISY Foundation partners with some 4,000 hospitals and schools in all 50 states and 26 nations to honor extraordinary nurses.

At St. Mary’s, each DAISY Award honoree is recognized at a public ceremony on their unit. Each honoree receives a certificate, a DAISY Award pin, and a hand-carved sculpture entitled “A Healer’s Touch.” In addition, they and their colleagues are invited to celebrate the occasion with cinnamon rolls, a favorite of the young man whose nurses inspired the creation of the DAISY Foundation.

Anyone can nominate a St. Mary’s nurse for the DAISY Award, including patients, patients’ family members, physicians, or colleagues. Any nurse in the St. Mary’s system — including those at all three hospitals as well as home health care and medical group offices — is eligible. The nomination simply asks you to share your story of why a nurse is special to you. St. Mary’s will honor eight nurses each year. Nomination forms can be obtained by calling Melissa McDaniel at 706-389-3890, Ext. 3.