Beloved Forest Hills Nurses Retire, Receive Celebration At Hospital

FOREST HILLS, QUEENS — Two nurses at a Forest Hills hospital walked out of their last day of work with a bang.

Nurses Phyllis Prawzinsky and Tracey Basta received a warm farewell from the staff at Long Island Jewish Forest Hills on Thursday after beginning their careers in the 1970s and getting ready to retire.

“I love taking care of the elderly. I sing to them, I hold their hand. We have mothers come in with babies and you can see they’re scared out of their minds, and I make them comfortable,” said Basta. “That’s what being a nurse is, it’s medicine, it’s keeping them safe, and it’s making them know everything is going to be OK, even when it’s not.”

Prawzinsky, 67, started her career as an ICU nurse in a Manhattan hospital. She’s been a nurse for 43 years, 10 of those as nurse manager of a step-down intensive care unit. Prawzinsky said one of her greatest privileges was caring for the 1,000th COVID patient at LIJ Forest Hills.

Basta, 61, started as a dietary aid when she was 16 at Franklin General Hospital and then worked her way up to receive a bachelor’s degree in science in nursing. She has worked for Northwell Health hospitals for 45 years, with 14 of those at LIJ Forest Hills where she’s the nurse manager of the emergency department.

Both women say their love of nursing may bring them back to LIJ Forest Hills on a per diem basis.