Milford resident Holly Brancato is nurse manager of the year at Bridgeport Hospital

BRIDGEPORT, CT (May 11, 2018) – Milford resident Holly Brancato, MSN, RN, Endoscopy Suite, is Bridgeport Hospital’s 2018 Nurse Manager of the Year.

The award was announced during a May 7 nurse managers’ reception by Gregory Buller, MD, associate chief medical officer and chair, department of Medicine, who read comments from Brancato’s nominators.

“Holly goes beyond the dedication, kindness, leadership and organization one would expect from an excellent manager,” said Dr. Buller. “She leads quietly by example in how she cares for patients. If a patient needs special arrangements, it’s done. She makes the unit run smoothly each and every day by keeping everyone on their toes and holding all colleagues accountable. She is simply irreplaceable.”

“When I first started working with Holly, she was assistant nurse manager and I was able to observe what she did to keep the unit running,” said Peg Parniawski, RN, director, Patient Care Operations, in recalling the qualities that led to Brancato’s promotion to nurse manager. “We recognized how valuable Holly is and how valuable the unit is to our hospital.”

Brancato received her Bachelor of Science degree in nursing from the University of Connecticut in 1984 and joined Bridgeport Hospital the same year as a staff nurse in the cardiac telemetry unit. She later worked in ambulatory medicine unit and medical ICU before moving to the endoscopy suite in 1999. Holly was promoted to assistant nurse manager in 2005 and to nurse manager in 2010. She obtained her master of science in nursing degree from Western Governor’s University in 2017.

The Nurse Manager of the Year Award is presented annually by the hospital’s medical staff, represented this year by Kenneth Lipow, MD, medical staff president. “I always saw this as a team sport,” Dr. Lipow said to the managers. “Physicians rely on the nursing staff to support what they do, especially achieving good outcomes for our patients.”

MaryEllen Kosturko, chief nursing officer, commented on the important partnership between physicians and nurses in providing patient care. “Leadership drives what happens to our organization,” she said. “The fact that we have a great combination of physician and nursing leaders helps drive change to improve our quality and decrease costs while providing better care.”