Awards created to honour nurse, continuing care assistant killed in N.S. mass shooting

Victorian Order of Nurses Canada is honouring two employees who were killed in the Nova Scotia April 2020 mass shooting with memorial awards.

The awards named for Heather O'Brien, a nurse, and Kristen Beaton, a continuing care assistant, were created at Dalhousie University.

O'Brien and Beaton, who was pregnant and working that morning, were shot in their separate vehicles along a stretch of road in Colchester County during the gunman's 13-hour rampage.

According to a press release, the awards will go toward supporting students within the continuing care assistant, licensed practical nursing and registered nursing programs.

They will be given students "who demonstrate attributes that both Heather and Kristen embodied in their work: caring, compassionate and dedicated to the community."

"We wanted it to be something that could go on for years, and honour them in a way that recognizes them as individuals, them in a health-care view, and a way for their families to see them in a positive, honourable way going well into the future," Carol Curley, regional executive director for VON Canada, told CBC in an interview on Thursday.

Curley said Beaton and O'Brien were deeply dedicated to the organization's mission to provide kind and competent care to patients in their homes. 

There was an outpouring of support to the VON from the community and former patients.

"Knowing that something is being done to honour their legacy, I would hope, in a very small way, softens the grief and helps the grieving process for the families," Curley said. 

VON Canada also worked with health-care programs at St. Francis Xavier University and the Nova Scotia Community College to develop the VON Memorial Award series.