Joseph Krivoruk, BSN, CCRN
Joseph Krivoruk, BSN, CCRN, is a critical care nurse in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) at Mount Sinai Brooklyn. During his 10 years at the hospital, he has witnessed the death of patients in his care. He is often the first health care provider a deceased’s family encounters, so he has played an important role consoling family members and offering emotional support. But Joseph long felt he wanted to do more. “I wanted families to know that although it isn’t our family member, we, as staff on the unit, understand the sadness and frustration, and we sympathize with their loss.”
The seed for an idea to do more was actually planted 14 years ago, when Joseph’s grandmother passed away from a brain hemorrhage and he was given a copy of her last CT scan. “Giving families something tangible to remember their loved one by seemed meaningful, it felt right.”
Through the spring and summer of 2023, Joseph and his family had a series of ailments and losses. During this time, he came across another hospital that gave a similar “take home” gift to families of children in the ICU. He shared his thoughts about such a gift with his manager, Jacqueline Callender, MPH, CCRN, and the Director of ICU, Ilse Martinez Espina, MD. In October 2023, the first “Message in the Bottle”—a printout of a patient’s last good heart rhythm, placed in a small bottle with a sympathy note—was given to a family member, and was positively received. The family appreciated being able to hold onto their loved one’s last heartbeat.
Message in a Bottle keepsake
Joseph’s journey into his current role hasn’t been straightforward. He began his career as an emergency medical services professional and eventually entered nursing school. “When my grandmother was ill, it became clear to me that nursing care is about dignity and safety.” His first nursing job was in home care hospice, where, Joseph says, these lessons of dignity and the values of acknowledging family, were reaffirmed. They are, he says, among the personal life lessons he often shares with nursing students and newly hired nurses at Mount Sinai.