Anthony Levesque This particular patient had been in the hospital for a while. He was unhappy. He lived alone at home, and his family was not local, and so, he had no visitors during his stay at Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital in Valencia. He became more unhappy as the days went on.   At the time, Anthony Levesque was in school for business and was working in housekeeping at Henry Mayo. Each night when he cleaned this patient’s room he’d talk to the patient. He’d listen to him, laugh with him and make him smile. It’s that kind of interaction that made Levesque reconsider a business degree and go to nursing school.  “I saw a smile on his face,” Levesque said during a recent telephone interview. “It really helped me determine that this is something I absolutely want to keep doing for the rest of my life.”  Levesque, 30, of Canyon Country, grew up in Frazier Park. In his teens, he wrote sports for the Frazier Mountain High School newspaper. He’d later intern for The Mountain Enterprise, the newspaper that covers Frazier Park and other nearby mountain communities, and that made him think seriously about a career in journalism.   In 2012, Levesque graduated high school. He moved to the Santa Clarita Valley to attend College of the Canyons, but he’d decided to study business for the practicality of it.   To make money, Levesque applied for a housekeeping job at Henry Mayo.   “I saw the hours online,” Levesque said. “It just seemed like an easy position for me. Also, both of my parents had previously worked — and actually still work — at Henry Mayo.”  Levesque grew to love his job. He said he enjoyed communicating with patients, getting to know them and helping them in any way he could. That pushed him to consider nursing as a career.   Registered nurse Anthony Levesque on Friday, Dec. 27, 2024, in front of the Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital main entrance. Katherine Quezada/The Signal And then there was a charge nurse at Henry Mayo named Melinda Nims who’d seen Levesque with the patients. She was very encouraging. According to Nims, Levesque took his job to heart, going out of his way to assist patients in any way he could.  “We would talk,” Nims said, “and he would ask me questions about, ‘How could I do better at this?’ Or he would come to me and say, ‘I’ve just cleaned this patient’s room, they really need this. Could you go help him with that?’ He became an integral part of our team, even before he decided he wanted to be a nurse. He took his role as being part of the whole team seriously, and he still does that.”  Nims added that Levesque has a way of speaking to patients. His life experiences, she said, taught him to be sincerely kind and gracious.   “If a patient needed something,” Nims said, “he (Levesque) would not relent until one of us — one of the nurses, a nurse’s aide, whoever — went and followed through with whatever it was that wasn’t within his scope to do. He made sure one of us did it. He was persistent in making sure that patients had what they needed.”  Nims told Levesque at the time that he should seriously consider nursing school, that he had what it took to be a nurse. She and Levesque would often talk about the steps he’d have to take, but Nims was straightforward about the difficulty of the path ahead.   In 2016, Levesque gave it a shot. He quit his housekeeping job and enrolled in a certified nursing assistant program at St. Jude’s Nursing School in Panorama City. He said the program would be the true testing ground to see if nursing would, in fact, be something he wanted to do for a living.   Nims said it touched her heart to learn that just a few simple words she shared with Levesque gave him the courage to give nursing a go.  Levesque got through the CNA program, and then he sought out work. But he couldn’t get a job at Henry Mayo just yet. He said he’d need “lots of experience” to get a job there.   “He had to leave us for six months before we could hire him,” Nims said. “He got some experience at a skilled nursing facility, waited the six months, and then he came back and applied at Henry Mayo as a certified nursing assistant. Then he put himself through nursing school while he worked at the hospital.”  Registered nurse Anthony Levesque on Friday, Dec. 27, 2024, at Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital in Valencia. Katherine Quezada/The Signal The skilled nursing facility that hired Levesque for those six months was Santa Clarita Post Acute in Newhall. Around that time, Levesque’s mom, who works in the admitting department at Henry Mayo, and his dad, who works in the engineering department there, were skeptical about their son’s career goals.  “Working in health care, we have to work holidays,” Levesque said. “We’re away from our families for long periods of time. So, nursing can be quite a difficult profession. But they (his parents) saw my drive and my motivation and my determination to get there, and they opened up to the idea.”  In 2021, Levesque enrolled in the accelerated bachelor’s degree program at West Coast University in North Hollywood. He graduated in June, and in September, he applied for and got a nursing job at Henry Mayo. He’s been there ever since, and he loves it.  According to Patrick Moody, director of marketing and public relations at Henry Mayo, Levesque’s journey was a unique one. To go from housekeeping to CNA, to nursing school and finally to nursing is not a path Henry Mayo nurses traditionally take. It’s a path that, Moody said, requires “tons of drive and determination.”  Nims said Levesque showed great focus and patience in his journey. It was a journey that’s given Levesque quite the perspective.  “It may’ve taken me longer to get to where I felt I needed to go,” Levesque said, “but to know all the steps in all these different jobs, and to know the aspects of every job in and out, I feel like it helps me be a better nurse.”   Registered nurse Anthony Levesque walks through the halls of Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital on Friday, Dec. 27, 2024. Katherine Quezada/The Signal Levesque spoke about how working in health care is a major team effort. The more he knows about the various roles on the team, he said, the more effective the whole team will be in helping the patients.   As for whether he made the right decision, Levesque answered that question with a strong yes. He loves helping patients, and he also loves educating them.   “I have a passion for education,” he said. “And it’s something that I get to do all the time now.”  And while Levesque admitted that he still has much to learn — he said he struggles with time management — he’s working hard every day to get better. In the end, it’s all about improving others’ lives, and he’ll continue doing whatever it takes to accomplish that goal, one patient at a time.  Know any unsung heroes or people in the SCV with an interesting life story to tell? Email [email protected].  The post Faces of the SCV: Nurse takes long way to the right job appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.