Social Worker of the Year honor surprises Appleton social worker

Cheryl Hentz

Contributor

December 2, 2024

APPLETON – For Julie Severin – a social worker and the social services director at Rennes Health & Rehab Center-Appleton – the fall conference of the Wisconsin Nursing Home Social Workers Association’s (WNHSWA) seemed like any other at first. 

But when it came time to present the Social Worker of the Year Award, Severin said things suddenly took an unexpected turn.

“When it was time for them to present the award, they said they had an administrator there to present the award and in walked my administrator and 15 people from Rennes,” Severin said.

In nominating Severin, Rennes Administrator Kendra Vanden Heuvel said Severin has the most “compassion and pride in her everyday work serving others at Rennes Health and Rehab for 27 years.”

“I could not think of someone more deserving of the 2024 WNHSWA’s Social Worker of the Year award,” Vanden Heuvel wrote in her nomination.

Severin said it was a very nice surprise, and “such an honor” to receive the award.

“I felt very blessed to have received this,” she said. “It really touched my heartstrings.” 

Passion drove her career choice

Severin said she had a close relationship with both her grandmothers growing up.

Though they wanted her to go into nursing, Severin said she didn’t feel that was the right fit for her. 

“When in school, I ended up doing an internship in a nursing home setting, and I just loved it,” she said. “I knew right then and there that that was my niche. I like working with the older population, and I love hearing their life stories and interacting with them. I also really enjoy helping residents and their families get through a rough patch in their lives or a major change and helping them (navigate) that. It’s extremely rewarding.”

Severin said the Rennes location she works at is an 88-bed facility, which cares for a wide range of people and age groups.

The facility, she said, also does rehab for people who’ve had joint replacements or some other kind of surgery and cares for younger people with chronic illnesses. 

“About half of the people we have are here for rehab with (joint) replacements, heart conditions, stroke rehab and so forth,” she said. “The other half of our people are here for long-term care, where they’ll be here for the rest of their lives.”

Vanden Heuvel said part of Severin’s role at Rennes is creating a successful discharge plan for those who are moving from one facility to another.

“She loves assisting a resident and their family through a challenging time and to see them thrive when they leave,” Vanden Heuvel said. “What fills Julie’s cup the most is knowing that she gets to help people every day by assisting them in leaving the facility in better shape and in a better place than they came in here at. Julie services the elderly population with pride, integrity, and so much compassion.”

‘Our Rennes family’

Severin said the image of nursing homes has changed dramatically over the years.

“We really try to individualize care here and make people feel more at home,” she said. “We offer a lot of amenities. People can bring in their laptops, and we have Wi-Fi, there are phones in people’s rooms, there are individual showers in the rooms.”

As far as activities, Severin said Rennes tries to tailor them to residents.

“We have a lot of live entertainment, we have arts and crafts, Bingo, card groups, pet therapy – even allowing residents’ pets to come visit – football pools and we also have more self-directed activities that people can do in their rooms,” she said.

Severin said Rennes also has a lot of family involvement and self-directed care.

“For family night events, we invite family in…,” she said. “It’s very much like a community. We call it our Rennes family.”

In her role as a social worker, Severin said she meets many different people with different family dynamics and different life stories.

“It’s challenging to be able to take whatever situation you’re presented with that day and help someone navigate through that and try to come out with some success from that,” she said. “Whether it’s a successful discharge plan, or someone who ends up liking it here at the nursing home and realizing there are great activities here, great food, (and wants to stay) – it’s those little successes and little rewards that I find very rewarding.”

Severin said “certainly, there are hard days” – just as with any job – but said she’s never regretted her career choice.

“I never know who is going to walk through my door that day – be it a resident, or a family member or someone new,” she said. “Or maybe it will be a new challenge, like getting someone insurance coverage, or putting together a successful discharge plan, or helping someone deal with the loss of a spouse or parent. Every day is different, but I love the challenge and rewards of it all.”

The pandemic

Severin said of the challenges she has faced in her 27 years in the industry, the COVID-19 pandemic ranks right up at the top. 

“Healthcare workers were still going to work during that whole period of time,” she said. “We lost a lot of our long-term care residents, so that was a very sad, very hard time. Besides all the masking, gloving and other precautionary procedures, it felt a little isolated for a lot of us.” 

Severin said not only were healthcare professionals still going to work, “we were the only ones seeing a lot of these residents.”

“We were their family during that time,” she said. “So, that was definitely one of the hardest challenges.”

Staffing issues can sometimes be challenging, which is true for anyone, Severin said – but she explained that they’re lucky at Rennes because they have a good staff base and with a lot of people who have been there for a long time.

That longevity is important, especially during times of struggles, or even if just one or two staff members are having a rough day.

Severin said she also has seen a lot of changes within the industry over the years – including an increase in shorter-term residents.

She said when she first started, they did a lot more long-term care – people came to the nursing home to live out their final days, she said.

“Now we’re seeing a lot more short-term rehab, as well as more people going to assisted living or returning home with in-home help,” she said.

Severin said the whole world of insurance has changed as well.

“There are a lot more shorter stays that insurance covers, and not so many longer stays (because it isn’t covered), so we’ve seen rapid turnaround,” she said. “Someone may just be here for a week or two because that’s all insurance is going to cover.”  

In an ever-changing, high-pressure industry, Severin said what keeps her going are the people.

“The residents themselves are the people I work for,” she said. “I may be employed by Rennes, but the residents are really who we all work for – to make things better for them as often as possible. It just takes that one person who says ‘thank you – you made a difference.’ You have to look for the little things. It sounds a little cliche but the little things add up to big things.”