Obstetric nurses stay for a long time

It's just something about babies. And a lot of things about being part of a team.

That's what several women cite as the reasons they've been obstetrics nurses at Kalispell Regional Medical Center for 20 years or longer.

The obstetrics staff is one of few in the hospital to have so many staff members with such long tenures.

About one-third of the department's 35 nurses have logged at least two decades in the department. Some of the women have been there 25 years. And at least one lays claim to 35 years.

"Either we treat these people really well," hospital spokesman Jim Oliverson says, "or they think they have the best job in the world."

It's a combination of both, the women say.

"We're really part of a team," explains Rosemary Brester, a 35-year obstetrics veteran.

"It's a sense of family," says Mary Miller, 52, who has been in the department for 25 years.

Brester, 59, and her colleagues appreciate that the nurses help each other while they're on the clock by picking up shifts when someone needs a vacation and get together off the clock for knitting groups or golf.

It also helps that the doctors they work with respect them and value their input, they say.

"When these ladies call," Oliverson says, "the [doctors] are on the road."

Regardless of supportive colleagues, the women simply are happy to be working with babies.

"Usually people in OB are happy to be in OB," Nancy Greer says.

Greer, 49, director of women's and children's services, has been at the hospital for 20 years. The nurses she works with typically are in obstetrics because they're family-oriented and love babies. Some nurses intuitively know they're meant to work with newborns; others find their way to obstetrics after trying other departments.

"For me it was a calling," Greer says.

Greer always wanted to work with deliveries and wasn't much interested in any other field of nursing.

Nurse Shirley Riebe, though, ended up in obstetrics because it was the only opening at the time. But Riebe, 55, liked it enough to stay. She has been with the department for 25 years.

The allure of seeing happy parents and children balances some of the job's less desirable aspects (such as changing all those diapers).

"They come in as a couple," Greer explains, "and they leave as a family."

Each of the nurses have her own memorable births.

Brester recalls the woman who showed up without a doctor and gave birth less than 20 minutes later.

"She delivered the baby and I just made sure it didn't fall on the floor," Brester said.

Riebe had one long day that she assisted with eight births.

There are some parts of nursing, however, that are memorable for the wrong reasons.

Nurses learn to distance themselves after they've been in the field long enough, but the memories of the moms who have difficult, life-threatening deliveries or deliver stillborns stick with the nurses.

"Sometimes you just cry right along with the parents," Riebe says.

Baby names and parents' faces, on the other hand, don't stay long in the memory.

"You just avoid Woodland Park," Brester jokes.

Parents frequently remind the women that they helped deliver their children. But after so many years and so many babies, they can't remember them all, Brester says. Occasionally parents will name the child after their nurse. Riebe had one family give their child her first name.

Throughout the years and the thousands of births the nurses have seen in the last 20 years, trends have ebbed and flowed.

Parenting techniques, ranging from breast feeding to laying children on their backs rather than stomachs, have gained and lost popularity. Medical practices and technology also have changed - and improved - in the past two decades.

The women also are on the front lines of seeing the trends in family structure.

They've noticed more single mothers in recent years. They've helped mothers who come in to deliver and leave their babies with pre-arranged adoptive parents.

They've also seen more babies who have problems resulting from their mothers' drug or alcohol use.

Any of the statistics, though, vary with each year, Greer says. The majority of families who deliver at the Kalispell hospital still fit the standard of mother, father and newborn.

Some of the nurses have begun their own families in the hospital they work in. Some have delivered their grandchildren.

You know you've been in obstetrics for a really long time when the grandfather of one of the infants is someone you used to baby sit, Brester says, speaking from personal experience.

But between supportive coworkers and the babies, the women are happy to be in obstetrics.

Reporter Camden Easterling can be reached at 758-4429 or by e-mail at ceasterling@dailyinterlake.com