Nurse navigator brings helping hand to cancer patients

[West Central Tribune, January 10, 2011] Sometimes the patient is just looking for a quick word of reassurance. But at least a couple of times a day, the door of Mari Damhof’s office at the Willmar Regional Cancer Center is closed because someone needs to cry.

Damhof is the nurse navigator at the Willmar Regional Cancer Center.

Barb Hoeft, director of the cancer center, describes her as “our go-to person.”

“Every cancer patient needs a nurse navigator to talk to,” she said.

The service is seen as so important that the cancer center and its clinical partner, the Virginia Piper Cancer Institute at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis, are financially supporting it to ensure it’s available to every patient at no charge.