Map the career of Ken Most, RN, and it’s apparent he’s tuned into a guidance system, although it’s quite unlike the high-tech spy plane electronics he worked on in the U.S. Air Force.

Most’s guidance system is in his chest. It’s called a heart, and he has followed it from military duty in the Persian Gulf in 1990 to a civilian nursing career in the small mountain town of Rifle, Colo.

In 2002, he was named the Colorado Health Care Association’s “Outstanding Caregiver” for his work at the Colorado State Veterans Nursing Home.

It’s a 100-bed long-term care facility with a 12-bed unit dedicated to residents with Alzheimer’s disease. Rules require that 85 percent of residents be veterans.

“We’ve got a lot of people here who are very near and dear to us,” said Most, 41. “I’m a veteran myself. I know they’ve given quite a bit for their country and now it’s time for their country to give back to them.”

In his 12 years at the veterans home, beginning as a certified nursing assistant and now as assistant director of nursing, Most said a lot of residents have been memorable. But one, a veteran from Wyoming who died early this year, is first on his mind.

“He had one leg amputated. He was a very hard person to take care of,” Most said. “There were only a couple of people he would let do anything for him. And I happened to be one of them.

“I truly miss him because he spent his whole life doing what he wanted to do and when he got down to a point where he had to be in a nursing home, he didn’t take it very lightly. And I think that’s how I’d be, too.”

Although the veterans are at a point in their lives where they need total care and a safe place to live, “all of our residents are highly, actively involved with our activities and our restorative program,” Most said. “We try to keep them coming back to a point where they at least have the maximum functioning for where they’re at.”

Everything at the home is geared toward the residents, from the restorative program where they work out on stationary bicycles and with weights under the direction of a registered nurse and two physical therapists to special-event meals.

“The other night they had a dinner here for the residents. It was a really fancy one—a candlelight dinner where the residents got to get dressed up. A lot of the managers stayed over and helped serve the dinner and bus the tables,” Most said.

“I’m a very touchy person,” he said. “I love to go out and shake hands and touch people. I love the fact that I can do things for them that make them feel good. I make them smile and ease their pain.”

It was that touch, that caring and affinity for residents, that caught the attention of administrators when Most was working as a certified nursing assistant five years ago. They asked him to enroll in a new CNA-to-RN program at Colorado Mountain College in Glenwood Springs.

About a year ago, he was promoted to assistant director of nursing, which he describes as a little bit of everything. He deals with families, works closely with nurses on patient care and care plans and oversees scheduling and staff development. As for his personal development, Most said, “I know the facility here eventually wants to make me the director of nursing, but you just never know what’s going to happen.”

For the time being, he said, it’s his turn to “be there” for his wife, Mary, a former CNA at the veterans home, and their children who backed him through school.

Asked to look through a three-year window, Most said he would like to have a bachelor’s degree from Colorado Mountain College, another step toward an eventual master’s degree and a career as a nurse practitioner. “It’s never too late to go back to school,” he said.

Most said that nurse salaries and benefits have come a long way in recent years, but the internal guidance system that has led him thus far tells him that nursing can’t be about personal economics. “It’s not a five-day-a-week job. Sometimes, it’s seven days a week and 12 hours a day,” he said. “If [patients] need you, you’ve got to be there. You have to want to give back to the people.”