KINGSPORT — A hospital can bring about high emotions, overwhelming circumstances and daily stress for its health care workers. But Ballad Health is aiming to create a space for its frontline nurses and team members to escape all that.
On Friday, Holston Valley Medical Center, along with Ballad’s Bristol Regional Medical Center and Johnson City Medical Center, unveiled its lavender room, which is designed to ease the mental, emotional and physical burdens of serving in the medical field.
“We all know that health care workers are exposed to stress, high emotions, lots of anxiety, too,” said Adnan Brka, HVMC chief nursing officer and vice president. “So this is going to be the perfect space for team members to relax and get recharged. They were all built for one purpose: to support our frontline team members.”
The room was designed to allow hospital workers to relax their mind and renew their energy through a quiet space similar to that of a spa.
The room behind the door with a lavender wreath offers zero-gravity reclining chairs. There is also a massage chair in front of a cinema screen that displays calming nature scenes with serene sound effects. The space also offers a yoga area and small salt walls, which are believed to reduce stress and boost energy.
“All of the equipment is top-notch equipment,” said Hamlin Wilson, Ballad Health’s senior vice president of employee relations, during the Friday ribbon cutting. “None of it is available typically to anyone who wants to go out and buy it. This is only available to spas, and we model this after what a spa experience would be like. We spared no expense for making this really a tremendous aspect for all of our team members.”
The Ballad Health Foundation provided almost $500,000 from its individual and local business donors, which made the lavender rooms throughout the Tri-Cities’ hospitals possible.
“You’ve heard the expression ‘this is why we can’t have nice things,’ said Ballad Health Foundation President Jack Simpson. “… But donors, they are why we can have nice things like this. It’s really through the generosity of the 4,000 individuals and businesses a year that support the foundation so we can do things like this.”
Ballad officials also spoke about the need for mental health support, specifically for health care workers.
“When you get on an airplane, they always tell you (in an emergency) to put your mask on before you put somebody’s else’s mask on,” Simpson said on Friday. “Self-care is vitally important for us all as humans and especially in health care workers.”
Brka has served in the medical field for more than 25 years. The health care professional said he never could have imagined a space available for nurses and other Ballad employees like the lavender room at HVMC. But it’s something he believes is certainly needed — specifically following the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Most recently we have faced the pandemic with lots of COVID patients,” Brka said. “It was very, very stressful. There were lots of emotions rising up. We had some lavender-type rooms that were small, but they were nothing like this. … Now it is time for us to regroup, refresh. What better way than to open the lavender room for our team members to spend time, relax and recharge.”
During Friday’s event, Matthew Duncan, a nurse at HVMC, tried one of the anti-gravity chairs in the lavender room.
“This is my first time actually trying it out,” Duncan said, as he reclined at the press of a button. He later spent time in the cinema screen room, enjoying a tranquil creek scene.
The lavender room is available for all Ballad employees throughout the building at any time, Brka said.
He added that he hopes employees take a moment to enjoy the space, but above all, he aims to see them refocus and check in on their own health.
“Our team members and our frontline workers are giving 100% of their time to provide support,” Brka told the Times News. “It’s always really easy to overlook taking care of your own health. This is going to be another opportunity for all of us to pull back and say, “I am providing care to our patients. I am giving everything. But I need to, at the same time, think about my health and not just physical health, but also mental health. That is very, very important.”
