Holy Cross Health proudly announces microbiology supervisor Michelle Schnobrick as Leader of the Quarter. With over 32 years of dedicated service at Holy Cross, she has consistently demonstrated exceptional leadership and innovation, steadily advancing through the ranks.

Working alongside her dedicated team, Schnobrick demonstrated remarkable resilience as she navigated the unprecedented challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. Throughout this period, she worked tirelessly to adapt to rapidly changing circumstances, implementing innovative solutions to ensure the continuity of operations, while also prioritizing the health and safety of her staff and community.

In the immediate aftermath of the pandemic, the microbiology blood culture analyzers experienced a critical malfunction, prompting Schnobrick to develop and implement a manual process for the daily plating and interpretation of blood cultures. Her swift and effective response ensured the continuity of essential laboratory operations during this challenging period.

While managing the manual processes, Schnobrick efficiently validated, correlated and integrated new analyzers into the EPIC system, successfully establishing the EPIC interface and bringing the analyzers online in record time. Upon resolving this issue, she swiftly transitioned to implementing molecular methods for expedited bacterial identification, significantly enhancing the speed of antibiotic treatment and contributing to improved patient outcomes.

Since then, Schnobrick has worked collaboratively to complete two optimization initiatives aimed at further enhancing the efficiency, all with the ultimate goal of advancing patient care. Throughout these efforts, she has fostered a highly engaged team that consistently recognizes her as an innovative leader who is open to new ideas and a skilled communicator who leads by example.