Carton to wrap up long tenure at BYS

Jacki Carton, who is retiring from her position as Butterfield Youth Services director of health services at the end of May, stands in front of a small man-made waterfall outside the BYS office. (Geoff Rands/Democrat-News) [Click to enlarge] [Order this photo]

Now that she's retiring, she said simply, "I feel really good that I had a part in all these kids' lives."

Carton was born in Saline County, and when back home with her husband visiting her grandparents during the 1970s, they saw a sign for "Butterfield Boys' Ranch" and decided to check it out.

"My husband, being a social worker, Tom (Butterfield) hired him," Carton said, after which she was irrevocably tethered to the children's home.

While working part-time at the old Fitzgibbon Hospital as an registered nurse, Carton found herself slowly drawn into BYS herself when approached by BYS founder Tom Butterfield.

"Tom knew I was an RN, so he asked if I would check the children's shot records. And you had to know Tom to understand, but when I came to check the kids' shot records, they didn't have any shot records. Tom probably knew that," she said.

She continued, "So, I would take the kids in to get their shots updated, and most of them did not have records, and had to start the series all over. It's amazing to see the changes, because now, when we get children, their shot records are there and up-to-date. It's a big change that's taken place in immunizations, I've noticed."

For about two years, Carton did volunteer work at BYS, but when Butterfield told her he needed an RN on staff for licensing, she became fully involved.

Carton said much of what she spent the last 34 years doing was establishing the nursing department and creating forms.

"Today, we have day treatment services, we have therapeutic foster care services," Carton said. "We didn't have anything like that back then. Tom Butterfield would be amazed if he saw all that there was here now."

The nursing department has grown and grown during Carton's time at BYS, and now employs two RNs, two LPNs and one nursing assistant.

"When I came here, the children had no funding for medical care," said Carton. "They had no Medicaid, and as I said, their shot records were nonexistent. I think there were kids just sort of lost in the system. And now, I see a lot more accountability in the system with children."

Advances in the quality of medical care the children receive, Carton said, are part of nationwide and system-wide advances in quality.

But Carton wasn't uninvolved in that betterment of the system.

"I organized nurses in the state who work in residential training programs. There was not a nursing organization at that time," she said.

Together, the nurses wrote the Missouri Coalition of Children's Agencies Medication Certification Manual, a training program on medication for child care workers used statewide. Though she has no confirmation of this, rumor has it, she said, that some other states have revised that manual for their own use.

Even though her employment is ending, Carton doesn't plan on letting retirement get between her and working for the children.

At BYS, Carton will continue to teach CPR and first aid "a couple of times a year." She will also write the pandemic flu plan for BYS and completely revise all of its health policies.

"I like to write," Carton said with a smile.

She also plans to continue her involvement in ensuring accreditation of BYS.

"I don't want to leave that for the next nurse," she said.

She will also remain active with the Mental Health Association of Saline County, an organization she helped found. For the 2009-2010 year, she will be president of the association, as she has been at least three times previously.

In her spare time, she plans to travel with her husband, the former director of BYS, to see her grandchildren, and to read more.

"I love to read and don't get any chance to read, it seems," she said.

She said she prefers nonfiction, especially biographies and political or historical writing.

Carton's ultimate achievement, she said, was "organizing the nurses in the state who work with children in residential programs. ... It's been a really good resource, because we call each other, we e-mail each other, and we wrote that medication manual ... and to me, it established better medical care for children in residential programs."

Carton's retirement party will be held at BYS from 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday, May 31. The public is welcome.

Contact Geoff Rands at marshallreporter@socket.net