Congratulations to Natasha Farris, our newest Starfish Award Recipient! Natasha is a Clinical Exercise Physiologist in our Electrographics area.

The Starfish Award recognizes team members who fill vital roles outside of nursing. These “difference makers” provide direct and indirect services to Riverside patients and the community.

Her nomination read: “Two weeks after having visited the Cardio Neuro EKG department at Riverside Hospital in Kankakee in early April to have a 30-day Holter monitor test started, I began to experience extremely painful skin irritation at the site of the patch. After having very little sleep due to my extreme skin irritation, I decided to ask my daughter to drive me back from the University of Illinois Champaign Urbana campus, where she attends law school, to seek help from someone at Riverside who might be able to remove the patch and attach a new one. I was extremely relieved that our 7:45 am unscheduled arrival at the department was met by an employee at the window who told us that we could be seen by someone who could offer some help. Not only did that happen very quickly and very easily, we also were greeted by a truly wonderful Riverside employee named Natasha, who immediately set about listening to my concerns, allaying those concerns with a reassuring smile and what appeared to me to be genuine concern for my situation, and who immediately began working to nearly eradicate the pain I was feeling from the skin irritation. I cannot tell you how much Natasha’s positive attitude, calm, yet lively and assuring presence, combined with her unique ability to take charge in a way that gave me confidence in her ability to help me while still valuing me as a person. That allowed me to retain my own independence, meant to me on both that day and, literally a little over a week later, when we again returned from Champaign to have her put on the final patch of the 30-day test. Natasha’s ability to instantly put me at ease by simply listening to my concerns and by giving me the impression that I was neither a bother or an unnecessary interruption in her day greatly reduced my stress and anxiety. Natasha’s personality and innate skills allowed her to handle my care in a confident, professional, yet genuinely empathetic, manner, and is certainly cause for her to be recognized by the Riverside community as a highly valuable resource.”