STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — As a registered nurse, Cathy Crawley spent more than 30 years caring for critically ill patients at Staten Island University Hospital before her April retirement. But now she finds herself receiving that very same critical care from her longtime work “family” in the Ocean Breeze hospital.

Crawley, 65, a brand-new grandmother, suffered both an ischemic stroke that converted into a brain bleed and a heart attack in August, requiring 13 days of intubation and a brain procedure called a decompressive craniotomy with an external ventricular drain, all in a New Jersey hospital.

After a few weeks, her family and former colleagues decided to move her to SIUH to be cared for by her work “family,’' said her husband, Howard, and former colleague, Christina Rodriguez.

Crawley

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