Alisha Hitt Paints Murals of Hope
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Alisha Hitt joined the team at Midland Memorial Hospital at the beginning of the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Alisha has always enjoyed art and murals. She decided to put her talents to use by hand painting a Halloween mural in bright colors for staff and patients on the Oncology Unit. Due to the rising number of COVID-19 patients, the Oncology Unit was getting transitioned to a COVID overflow floor. Halloween decorations started to be replaced by PPE for the physicians and nurses that were going to be working on the unit with COVID patients.
After working on the COVID Ward for 5-months, she and her co-worker, Heather Hale, decided that the staff needed encouragement.
“As COVID nurses, we would never be able to do our job we needed to do without everyone else at MMH,” she said. “I just want to say thank you to MMH and the FEMA nurses that were sent by the state.”
Alisha and Heather reached out to our VP of Nursing, Kit Bredimus for the green light on creating a painted mural at the front of the hospital. She explained that she was limited on time because of the cold front that was coming.
Alisha spent ten hours that were split between two days on creating this mural. She said that she didn’t have an exact design in mind. She knew that she wanted to include a physician’s jacket, lungs for our respiratory therapists, and other drawings that included the rest of the staff.
“I wanted to use my artistic ability to reach a lot of people at once, “she said. “It is so nice to know that you are appreciated and during this time it’s hard to keep going.”
She explained that as a COVID nurse, she goes to work, gears up, and receives her patients for the day.
“These last three weeks have been the hardest weeks I’ve experienced throughout this whole pandemic,” she said. “At the end of a very hard day, I like to smile. I was hoping to make people smile as they were arriving or leaving.”