A Career Improving Emergency Medicine at Public Hospitals in the Bronx
Fund for the City of New York Presents Sloan Award to Janice Halloran, Administrator in Charge of Emergency Rooms at HHC's Jacobi and North Central Bronx Hospitals in the Bronx
Jun 04, 2014
The New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation (HHC) today announced that for the fifth year in a row, an HHC employee has been honored with the Sloan Public Service Award, considered the Nobel Prize of City government. This year’s award was presented by the Fund for the City of New York and Mayor Bill de Blasio to HHC’s Janice A. Halloran, a Bronx native who has dedicated her 23-year career to improving emergency medical care for the borough’s residents.
- Previous Winners
- Stanlee Richards
- Donna Leno Gordon
- Elva Rodriguez
- Julius Berger
Ms. Halloran began her career as an ER Aide and moved up through the ranks to serve as Senior Associate Director. She has 24-hour operational responsibility for the emergency rooms at two HHC hospitals in the Bronx – Jacobi Medical Center and North Central Bronx, which together receive about 175,000 visits annually. She is also the Chairperson for Network Emergency Preparedness as well as the Bronx Emergency Preparedness Coalition, acting as the Bronx’s go-to person for any disaster to strike New York City. She played a vital role in emergency care during and after Hurricane Sandy and is a key member of the Trauma Care team that helped victims of the recent Metro-North train derailment near the Spuyten Duyvil station.
Ms. Halloran is one of six people chosen for the award citywide. The 41-year-old Sloan Public Service Awards are presented annually by the Fund for the City of New York to civil servants. Winners come from all levels and ranks of City government, and are selected by a diverse and independent panel. Winners receive a cash prize of $10,000.
“The Sloan Award is a top prize, given for dedicated public service to the people of New York City, and I can think of no person more deserving than Janice Halloran,” said HHC President Dr. Ram Raju. “She is completely devoted to delivering better health care, her colleagues respect and admire her, and she thrives under pressure. She is also an extraordinary emergency planner and manager, and constantly seeks ways to improve the hospitals where she works. We are all very happy for her and proud to have her represent HHC.”
When Hurricane Sandy hit in 2012, Halloran was at Jacobi for 96 hours straight, working with her team to care for patients evacuated from other hospitals and along with her colleagues establishing a Special Medical Needs Shelter at Lehman College that housed, fed and cared for up to 600 people each day. A 2013 article in the local newspaper Bronx Times describes how she coordinated the response to the Metro-North train accident that resulted in 13 patients being brought to Jacobi Medical Center’s Level 1 trauma center.
Ms. Halloran is a Bronx native who lives on City Island, raised in a family where her father, Michael Halloran, was a proud employee of the New York City Department of Sanitation and encouraged his children to go into public service. According to Ms. Halloran though, emergency medicine management was not something she originally set out to do.
“I didn’t know anything when I first started in 1991, but when I landed here I immediately found my niche,” she said. “Emergency medicine is for people with a certain personality and resilience. You can’t have a bad day. You have to remember than no matter how you feel, when you’re at work you’re always going to meet patients who are having a much worse day than you are.
“It can be hard for some people when you have to bring your ‘A’ game every day,” said Ms. Halloran. “You can never not be ready. But the instant gratification I get when I help someone in need makes it worth it. I see it as my purpose. The folks that need help the most are the people I most want to help. It’s my 23rd year but I feel like I’m just getting started.”
The six Sloan Award recipients were nominated by their colleagues, peers and friends and selected from more than 250,000 eligible workers in the mayoral agencies, the Transit and Housing Authorities, HHC, The City University of New York, the district attorneys’ offices and the public libraries.
The selection committee looks for nominees who embody extraordinary service delivered with ingenuity, energy, and compassion; commitment beyond the call of duty; responsiveness to public needs, developing more effective methods of service delivery; outstanding and reliable performance, both under the pressures of daily routine and in times of crisis; willingness to take risks, if needed to improve services or correct abuses or inequities; ability to adapt to change and provide a continued high standard of service to the public; and dedication to upholding public interest amidst competing interests, pressures, and demands.
The awards were presented at The Cooper Union in Manhattan. Previous Sloan Award winners from HHC include Stanlee Richards, RN, in 2013; Donna Leno Gordon, RN, in 2012; Nurse Practitioner Elva Rodriguez in 2011; and Julius Berger, DDS, in 2010.
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