During a recent ice and snow storm, Dr. Amanda Carroll of Mercy Hospital Jefferson baked about 500 chocolate chip cookies to cheer up the staff who were either working there at the time or stuck at the hospital due to travel worries.
Carroll, an obstetrician-gynecologist, took on the baking project during the weekend of Jan. 4-5 when she decided to remain at the Crystal City hospital rather than travel back and forth on treacherous roads to her home in Desloge.
Nancy Dennis, a labor and delivery nurse at the hospital, said she appreciated Carroll’s thoughtfulness.
“I was on night shift and came out of a room, and there was Dr. Carroll with a big cart of cookies,” Dennis said. “I started laughing and said, ‘Hello, Betty Crocker.’”
Dennis lives in Crystal City, so she was not as concerned about commuting as some of the hospital staff members with longer drives. Still, she said Carroll’s baking effort touched her, adding that she knows many of her colleagues felt the same way.
“People loved her cookies so much they kept coming back for more,” Dennis said. “Her thoughtfulness, kindness and generosity were appreciated by staff, and her cookies were amazing.”
Carroll, 42, said she arrived at the hospital on Jan. 4 and did not return home until Jan. 6 and baked the cookies on Jan. 5 in the hospital cafeteria kitchen.
“Because I live far away from the hospital and I knew there was going to be ice and snow and I knew Hwy. 67 was going to be difficult driving, I stayed at the hospital,” Carroll said. “I only come in when there are babies to deliver.”
She learned that about 150 staff members were working in the building over the weekend and some were staying the weekend because of the winter storm, so she decided to bake the cookies.
“There are a lot of people that work at the hospital in maintenance, housekeeping, other departments,” Carroll said. “On the fourth floor, they had old patients rooms where they brought in cots for the workers who stayed through the weekend. I’m not sure how many had to stay at the hospital.
“On (Jan. 5), I discharged a patient who had delivered a baby. After the discharge, I didn’t have any in labor.
“I didn’t have anything going, so I called the kitchen supervisor. It was a Sunday and she said I could use the kitchen. She told me I could use the whole ‘baking corner’ in the cafeteria. It’s got a mixer, a counter, a convection oven and all the tools you need for baking. On the weekends, nobody uses it.”
Carroll said she enjoyed using the hospital’s cafeteria appliances, like this industrial-sized mixer.
Carroll then braved the elements to go shopping and purchase all the ingredients she needed to make cookies.
“I went to Walmart and got ingredients,” she said.
Carroll, a veteran baker, said it took less time than she would have expected to make hundreds of the tasty treats.
“It only took me a couple of hours,” she said. “The convection oven cooked so fast. I had four cookie sheets. Each sheet held 20 cookies.
“I made about 500 cookies. I made a chocolate chip cookie recipe I got on the internet many years ago.”
After that, Carroll distributed the cookies to staff throughout the hospital.
“I used the aluminum trays they use in the cafeteria to serve food,” she said. “I put them on cafeteria carts.
“I distributed the cookies at the time they change shifts so I could get the people coming on shift and going off their shifts. I had a couple labor and delivery nurses come with me. We started in the patient care areas and got them to the nurses and physicians. We went to the E.R. and the ICU. We went to the lab and the pharmacy. We went to housekeeping and maintenance. We made sure we left cookies for the guys clearing the parking lots.”
Carroll said she had taken goodies made at home for hospital staff in the past, but this was the largest baking effort she ever tackled.
“I had never done anything like this on this scale,” she said.
Carroll said she felt all the effort was worth it.
“I wanted to do something to say, ‘Hey, I recognize the sacrifice you’re making,’” she said.
Carroll said she enjoyed using the cafeteria appliances.
“They have an industrial-sized mixer that was completely full,” she said. “I loved the mixer.”
Jamie Stout, another labor and delivery nurse, said she enjoyed helping Carroll give out the cookies.
“It was phenomenal,” Stout said. “It was so much fun. I felt like an elf at Christmastime.”
Carroll, who was born at Mercy Hospital Jefferson (known then as Jefferson Memorial Hospital), began working as an obstetrician-gynecologist 11 years ago and started delivering babies at Mercy Hospital Jefferson in May 2020.
“I keep track of all the babies I’ve delivered at Mercy Jefferson,” she said. “I’m at 720.”
That number includes the babies delivered during her cookie-baking weekend.
“(On the night of Jan. 5), I delivered two babies,” she said. “Everything went well.”
She said she also likes to crochet, and many of the babies she delivers receive the fruits of that hobby.
“I crochet hats for babies I deliver,” she said. “I give out all I make. I have labels I make and put in the hats that say, ‘Made by Dr. Carroll.’”
She and her husband, Adam Carroll, have four children: Maddie, Meredith, Walker and Warner.
Her parents – Denny and Marjie (Tucker) Geniec – grew up in Jefferson County, she said.
“My mom graduated from Crystal City and my dad graduated from Fox,” she said. “They’re retired and live in Florida. They both were teachers in (North St. Francois County School District).”