TUPELO, Mississippi—North Mississippi Medical Center recently presented the DAISY Award to Mackenzie Garner, RN, of 3 Central.

Garner cared for a patient whose wife stayed with him. He was admitted the night before his wife’s 99^th birthday. “Mackenzie was very touched by the couple’s love and devotion to one another and was saddened the wife could not appropriately celebrate her birthday in the hospital,” a coworker wrote in her nomination. “When Mackenzie left her shift the next morning, she went to the store and bought the wife a birthday card, cupcakes and two ‘9’ candles.”

When Garner returned to work that night, she got her coworkers to sign the card, take the cupcakes with candles into the patient’s room and sing “Happy Birthday” to his wife. “Thank you, Mackenzie, for going above and beyond to make this lady’s birthday a special day,” she wrote.

Garner, who lives in Tupelo, joined the 3 Central team as a registered nurse in 2021 after working a year as a nurse extern at NMMC. A 2018 graduate of Booneville High School, she earned her associate degree from Northeast Mississippi Community College in 2021.

The DAISY Award is an international program that rewards and celebrates the extraordinary compassionate and skillful care given by nurses every day. Nomination forms are available throughout NMMC or at www.nmhs.net/daisy-award. For more information, call (662) 377-3431 or email daisyawards@nmhs.net.