ATLANTA — For one nurse, caring for the moms and new babies in labor and delivery at Northside Hospital is a passion, a passion found in her own family's experience.
"I think I probably have the best job in the world," Jenny Andris said with a smile.
The decision to work in the hospital wings is rooted in her personal experience.
"I was entering high school when my mom was diagnosed for the first time," Andris said. "I got to see the role that Northside provided in her care, and I got to see how the nurses and the doctors, techs, everyone kind of helped her through that journey."
Such time spent at Northside inspired Andris to pursue nursing. But turns out, it's a bit of a family calling.
"At such a formative age that's kind of all I knew was caretaking and health care involved in our family," Amy Tortoriello, Andris' sister said, recalling her mother's diagnosis and treatment. "It's really all I grew up knowing."
Now, a decade after Andris, Tortoriello will also join the ranks of Northside nurses. A rising senior at Georgia Southern University, Tortoriello will spend the summer in the hospital's extern program, starting her career after witnessing her sister work through a pandemic.
"It was very scary in the beginning," Andris said. "You know, when we didn't know how (COVID-19) was spread or how infectious it was. But ultimately, I just realized this is what I signed on to do in nursing school. And you realize in nursing school that while it might not be a pandemic, you will be walking into people's lives and their situations where they are really sick and you do need to help them."
That call to help includes guiding a new generation of nurses, like her sister, with hopes of reinvigorating the field.
"I think that it's so important for us nurses who have been here for a while doing this job to remember what brought us here," Andris said, "Because it has been a long three years of this pandemic. So for us to see this, this excitement, this eagerness, this general passion for the field, it for me reminds me 'OK, I remember.'"
While for her sister, there's excitement in starting her own path, while working alongside the one who has influenced her along the way.
"I've seen her love her job for 10 years, and that is all I want to do," Tortoriello said. "Watching her go through those ups and downs is really what makes me want to stick with it even more."