“About the first week of ‘84 we started training and we opened up for business in October,” says Dan Mueller, one of the original nine nurses who were part of the new program coming to Mayo that year. That was almost four decades ago.
Though they weren’t the first hospital in United States to use to a helicopter but, according to Mueller, theirs were the largest. One of the helicopters that had once landed at Mayo came from Illinois, was small and landed in a make shift landing pad in a parking lot.
During the Summer of 1984, Mueller says he, along with the eight other nurses, under went orientation and training since this was a brand new program. That included getting safely on and off the helicopter, loading and taking off patients as well as what else to do while in the air.
Mueller’s interest in pursuing a career in the medical field began soon after he graduated from Lourdes High School. Becoming a medical aid, “medical assistant back then”, he worked at a hospital in town on the neurological floor before moving down to the emergency field. It was at this same time, Mueller was getting his nursing degree at Rochester Community College which would soon help him get into Mayo.
Staying on the emergency floor, Mueller also worked in outreach working with other hospitals in the area; collaborating with them to figure out what was working and what wasn’t working as well as working on bettering ways to bring patients to Mayo. It was around this time that he decided to try something new... which would take him to the sky.
“I like taking care of people and I think this will be very exciting,” Mueller recalls thinking as he and eight others became the original Mayo One flight nurses. And while Mueller says there were definitely times “working in the trenches” he was never scared when he was in the air. However, that same feeling can’t be said for his wife Ellen.
“I knew that’s what he did so I just had to accept it,” Ellen says. The two’s meeting was almost by chance; though Ellen grew up and graduated from high school in Iowa she pursued a medical career by going to Rochester Community College as well. It’s there that she realized she, in fact, did not want to become a nurse. Instead, she became a medical secretary working in pediatrics before moving to “our area” according to Dan.
A fellow nurse set Ellen and Dan up on a blind date by inviting them both over for dinner, along with another couple to ease the awkwardness. Dan says he resisted asking Ellen out “for years” before Ellen eventually “tackled me”. After twenty four years of marriage, Dan says humor is very important to keeping it successful. The actual story, the dinner, went well they both say and was comical since the dinner that night had to be adjusted since the oven wasn’t working.
Both Dan and Ellen retired earlier this week; Dan’s last day was Monday, Ellen’s was on Tuesday. Dan worked for Mayo for 36 years while Ellen worked at Mayo for 41.
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VIDEO: Original Mayo One Flight Nurse Retires and Looks Back - KAAL
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