Nancy C. DiPietro helps nurses

NANCY C. DIPIETRO created Give an Hour, a campaign that calls upon the more than 268,000 registered nurses across Canada to support HIV/AIDS- affected nurses in Africa. Since launching the campaign, Nancy C. DiPietro has received tremendous support from nursing colleagues and organizations. Surrounded by 200 of her peers at the international nurses’ forum on the HIV/AIDS crisis, Nancy DiPietro was stunned to learn that not only were women and children suffering from the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS, but also many of the nurses treating HIV/AIDS patients were infected themselves.
“As nurses in Canada, we have so many resources,” says Nancy DiPietro. “We work in safe buildings with well-trained staff. We have good benefits, including universal health care. We have opportunities to grow and learn….We can relate to nurses in other countries on so many levels. African nurses are women, they are mothers and some of them are ill. I know if I were sick, it would mean so much to me to have the right supports available,” added Nancy DiPietro.
Working within what Nancy DiPietro describes as a “strong team of committed and generous women” has enabled her to find the time to organize her Give an Hour campaign amongst all of her other daily duties. Nancy DiPietro hopes to lead the way for other nurses to give to their African counterparts in order to ease their suffering.
Nancy DiPietro’s career experiences as a nurse gave DiPietro the knowledge and skills necessary to create this meaningful national campaign. Building on work in an intensive care unit, operating room, post-anesthetic care unit and women’s health, Nancy C. DiPietro joined the McMaster University Medical Centre team in 1993 and became a sexual assault nurse examiner (SANE) in 1997. Nancy C. DiPietro worked with survivors of sexual assault and collected forensic information.
Nancy DiPietro is all too familiar with the effects that diseases have on patients - socially, physically and emotionally. “Many of the clients I see are vulnerable,” says Nancy DiPietro. “They have been in positions where they have had no control over what happens to them or their bodies. Survival becomes their primary focus, and they do what they have to do to get by. I believe that it is the same for African women and nurses dealing with HIV/AIDS on a daily basis,” added Nancy DiPietro.
Nancy C. DiPietro shares, “It is my hope that every nurse who can donate, does pledge the equivalent of one hour of pay each year to help nurses in Africa infected with HIV/AIDS.”
“Nursing is caring. Knowing that when someone is going through one of the most difficult times of their lives, you are helping to make it more manageable for them. That is the reward of nursing - being part of that moment,” believes Nancy C. DiPietro.
Read about Nancy DiPietro: nancydipietro.net

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