In a five-minute interview taped in August 2008, operating room nurse Jaime Dillenger describes her professional association with Kenneth Appell, dating back to 1982 (transcript follows).
"My name is Jaime Dillenger; I worked with Dr. Appell for 20 years in the O.R. at Northern Dutchess Hospital. Dr. Appell was the best surgeon I have ever worked with in my entire life. And having worked in an O.R. for almost 30 years, I’ve worked with a lot of surgeons. He was a wonderful teacher. When I went to work in the O.R. I had no O.R. experience, and he taught me many, many different things. Um, he was very respectful with tissue and excellent with anatomy, and he was a great teacher, and I always loved working with him.
I started in the O.R. in 1982. I’d worked in the E.R., so I knew him from the Emergency Room when I was in nursing school. And then I worked from 1982 till 2000 in the OR itself. And, you know, he became like my father, and you know, like I said, he was wonderful to work with, he was kind to the staff. You always felt that no matter how bad your case was, he would get you through. Even if it was an emergency, you didn’t see him getting ruffled or yell at you because something wasn’t going right, you know what I mean? It was like, there was always a purpose: okay, this is not a good thing, but, okay, we’ll fix it. Whatever the situation was, you just knew you were safe, you know what I mean? He would take care of the situation and he would get you through it and everything would be okay. He didn’t lose his cool, he didn’t yell at you, he didn’t scream at you – at anybody – you know what I mean? It was, “okay, this is what we need to do, and we will do it.” You knew the seriousness of the situation but you would remain calm because he was calm. I’m sure inside we were all panic-stricken (laughs), but like I said, you remained calm because he was. You knew he knew what he was going to do next. [With some other surgeons] you can definitely see that, “this is bad and I’m really not sure what to do.” And even if he thought that, you didn’t know he was thinking, “ oh, boy, this is a sinking ship.” You never, ever had that feeling with him. I’ve worked with a lot of surgeons, and you don’t always have that feeling that it’s going to be okay, that we’re going to work this out and everything’s going to be fine. You don’t have that all the time.
[I also became friends with him and his wife outside work,] especially after I divorced and after my dad died. When I was building the house, they would go every Sunday after church to check on the progress of the house and see how things were going. He would come to work on Monday and he would say, “I was out to Kansas yesterday” – my house borders on Kansas Road – “Marcy and I went to Kansas after church!” (laughs)
I remember one night working through an aneurysm with him and Dr. Wing, like, all night. And we finished at, like, four or five o’clock in the morning. I went to take a shower and he went into the lounge on the couch. And then I went in afterwards and made coffee for him, and he’s laying on the couch with a blanket and a pillow… (chuckles)
It was just so enjoyable to work with him. He would do anything – and especially in later years, when he was not doing as much surgery but helping Dr. Wing more – you know, he’d come back in the room, he’d be mopping the floor, he’d be helping you make the bed, you know what I mean, he’d be sitting in the lounge. Like I said, he was just an absolute pleasure to work with. He really was."
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