A Navy veteran and flight nurse by background, Kelsey Knutti began looking for a veteran organization to volunteer with when she returned to her native Illinois permanently. That search led her to join Honor Flight Chicago’s medical guardian team in 2014, and she has consistently raised her hand to fly at least once per year since.
A master’s degree holder in public health, she currently works as the nursing director at her facility, overseeing several different areas including home care, acute rehabilitation, and palliative and hospice programs. Her experience in the Navy is playing a large role in informing her leadership through our current crisis.
“A big part of my job right now is surge planning and ramping up our critical care areas,” she said. This includes ventilators, ICU beds and working through new transitions in how patients receive care.
“You don’t see the preparations going on, you only see when situations become dire,” she said.
“My supervisor told me the other day, she said ‘you are in your element.’ So much of my military background is coming out. We need to be prepared, we need to practice and plan. Seeing people bond and come together across all different areas of our hospital is bringing back really good memories. It reminds me of the worst times in Iraq or on a flight (when teams executed).”
Kelsey has found steady care for her child and paused her MBA to be able to selflessly throw herself headlong into this battle. Likewise, she sees her entire community inside and outside the hospital stepping up.
“It has been wonderful working with our community partners,” she said. “We have two people right now who are full-time managing donations of PPE and things like hand sanitizer and hand soap. We are also handling our staff with compassion, caring for them as we care for our patients. This involves how we are rotating people out, how we say thank you with gift cards or a free coffee, and a few people on our HR team are connecting our staff with freebies that are out there.
“People are tired, extra-emotional and they are worried. So continuing to have fun and celebrate little moments like birthdays are huge.”
Each year Kelsey takes time out of her schedule to thank our veterans with Honor Flight Chicago, and it is now our privilege to be able to celebrate and thank her for all she is doing in the fight against COVID-19.
“A big part of my job right now is surge planning and ramping up our critical care areas.”