The Employee for the month for Palisades Healthcare is Emily Ballinger, Licensed Nurse Practitioner (LPN). Ballinger is originally a Texan who then moved to California, which is where she met her husband and, not to put too fine a point on it, but he dragged her up this way.
“We bought his grandpa’s farm, and actually his grandpa was a resident here,” Ballinger said.
“What we did out there was that we were actually firefighters,” she said. “Wildfire firefighters.”
Something like wildfire firefighting is most certainly an objectively dangerous, tough and rigorous job. Ballinger said that as firefighters they were often called to accident scenes as well, and acted as first responders for car crashes and other emergency situations.
“I think that’s what got me into wanting to try nursing,” she said. “Helping people in situations like that. When we came here to South Dakota, I went to Southeast Tech for my nursing degree and then worked at Sanford. Then I wanted to work a little closer to home and so I took the job at Palisades Healthcare and I love it. It was a real change of pace, and very different from the clinic, in that there, you just did as the doctor ordered and got the tasks done. Whereas here you’re kind of the resident or patients’ advocate, because we don’t have a doctor here all the time. So, you are in charge of their welfare. So, when you see something wrong or you notice something, you’re the one in charge of getting them the help they need.”
“I think the residents are what makes me love the job so much,” she said. “You build a real relationship with them. And everything and anything you do to help improve or brighten their day is wonderful, and it gives me a lot of satisfaction to be a part of that. I feel like we’ve just got good residents and good people here, they’re so kind to each other and it’s great to be a part of that. We’ve got a good staff too, and management has always been willing to help me out when I need it and that counts for a lot.”
When we asked Ballinger what she does for fun, she said that outside of work she has a four-year-old who takes up a great deal of her time, but that aside from that she and the family love spending time outdoors and she enjoys reading a good book, and is not picky on the genre as long as she enjoys the narrative.
Look for our next in this series soon.
