An awards ceremony can be glitzy, impressive, exciting and celebratory. The third annual ajcjobs Nursing Excellence Awards banquet on Wednesday at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre was all that and something more: heartwarming.

"Heart" is an intrinsic part of the nursing profession.

Photos by BARRY WILLIAMS/Special (ENLARGE)

Dr. Randy Martin's keynote address listed many contributions of nurses and praised their communication skills compared with those of physicians.

(ENLARGE)

Mary Anne Newkirk listens as Joel Ganyard reads the nomination submitted by his wife, who said Newkirk 'made me realize I had strength I didn't know I had.'

(ENLARGE)

Doretta Thomas-Fleet, who works with children who have profound disabilities, reacts to her selection as a top honoree at the Nursing Excellence Awards. Her husband, Ivan, and sons, John, 4, and Ivan Jr., 9, were there to celebrate with her.

"Nurses are people with a passion to make a difference in other people's lives, and they do so with innovation and ingenuity; grace and compassion; communication and caring," Dr. Randy Martin said in his keynote speech. Martin is a professor of medicine and director of noninvasive cardiology at Emory University as well as a health reporter for WSB-TV.

"The one lesson I've learned in my 39 years of seeing lots of very sick patients is that nurses are the most important people in health care. They are the cornerstone in delivering care," he said.

Caring can take many forms in today's complex health care arena, as evidenced by this year's 10 finalists, selected by a panel of nurse leaders from more than 300 nominations. The 10 honorees were Starla Ingalls Adamson, Liz Bilinski, Phyllis S. Coker, Kathleen Gamblin, Celeste McConkey, Peter Roth, Christine Saggese and the three top honorees: Ann Connor, Mary Anne Newkirk and Doretta Thomas-Fleet.

Patients and co-workers nominated nurses not only for their skills and knowledge but also for their willingness to go above and beyond the call of duty. When Adamson, a nurse manager in a postsurgical unit at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, heard the call for medical assistance on an airplane flight, she answered immediately. She gave CPR to a passenger whose pacemaker had stopped working, and she saved his life.

Gamblin helps cancer patients navigate a maze of surgeries and treatments at the STAT Cancer Clinic at WellStar Health System. She relentlessly cut through red tape and financial needs to reunite a dying woman with her family in California, so that the woman's 12-year-old daughter would be cared for.

The mentally and physically challenged students at the Heritage School in DeKalb County don't understand the complex medical treatments that school nurse Thomas-Fleet administers daily. But they know her loving touch and her encouraging voice.

One couple never will forget Newkirk, who works in the antepartum unit at WellStar Kennestone Hospital. She had eased the fears of and encouraged the young mother-to-be, who was having difficulties with her pregnancy. When tragedy struck, Newkirk rushed from home to stay by the couple's side during the delivery of their stillborn son.

"She made me realize I had strength I didn't know I had," Jennifer Ganyard wrote in her nomination letter. "Mary Anne is a dedicated nurse who cares deeply for her patients."

As an assistant professor at the Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing at Emory University, Connor inspires and challenges her students to practice nursing beyond hospital walls. She shows them how to deliver primary care to migrant workers in South Georgia and how to help the guests of Café 458, an Atlanta reservation-only restaurant and social services center for the homeless, which Connor helped to found in 1988.

Martin called nursing "a fabulous and underappreciated profession."

The Nursing Excellence Awards event places the accomplishments and dedication of nurses at center stage in the well-deserved spotlight.

ON THE WEB

For more coverage and profiles of the honorees, visit Celebrating Nurses.