Congratulations to Erin Wendt, Public Relations Coordinator for Blank Children's Hospital, for receiving an UnityPoint Health - Des Moines ACE Award. The ACE (Always Committed to Excellence) Awards recognize the outstanding achievements of UnityPoint Health - Des Moines employees. Below is the nomination letter written for Marlene and an example of the great work she does for UnityPoint Health - Des Moines.

Erin Wendt is Blank Children's Hospital's (BCH) public relations go-to woman. She has great ideas and always puts a polished and positive spin on BCH for our patients, families and staff.

I am a member of the Neonatal Transport team at BCH. One of my responsibilities is to transport newborns that need a higher level of care. These families are often in crisis regarding this transfer. After we provide the necessary medical interventions, get the baby admitted to the NICU and get the family settled in the room, there is a transport certificate and pin we provide each baby. The families love this little souvenir for the baby book.

We were running low on transport pins so I asked Erin to order more. Erin offered to look at a new design for the BCH transport pins. The Neonatal Transport team was eager to see the new design, but Erin surprised us by designing two pins - one to look like our Life Flight helicopter and one to look like our special Neonatal-Pediatric Ambulance. We loved both designs!

The pins arrived and are perfect. We love using them because we can individualize the transport certificates and pins for each individual experience. Our families love receiving them and there will be stories told with happy endings regarding those early days of life when the babies were transferred to the Variety Club Intensive Care Nursery. Thanks Erin. We appreciate your extra efforts and attention to detail.