TAMPA, Fla. — There was a time — 54 years ago this week, to be exact — when Brenda Junco was the new kid on the block at Tampa General Hospital.
This was back in the '70s, when organ transplants were a fresh kind of wonder.
Brenda says, "It was like weeks, months" before transplant recipients could go home — if there were no complications, that is.
WATCH: Nursing legend Brenda Junco celebrates 54 years at Tampa General Hospital
Skip ahead more than half a decade — with Dr. Brenda Junco now a nursing legend with her doctorate, no less — and the realms of medicine and technology have changed exponentially.
"Now patients come in, they get a kidney, they go home in three or four days," she says.
Brenda's endurance at TGH is remarkable, but her story is even more appealing because she's homegrown, a Cuban-Spanish Tampa native with degrees from both USF and the University of Tampa. She's so us in fact, her grandfather was a cigar roller.
If you're wondering about Dr. Brenda Junco's pending retirement — don't. A new, fancy tower is being built at TGH to provide more room for transplant patients. She definitely wants to be around for that.
Plus, this is her passion, this is her gift to multiple generations of patients, nurses, doctors, and more.
"What would I do if I retired? This is all I know," she says. "This is a life well-lived, and I think it keeps me young."
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