Elderly female in a hospital room with yellow floral-patterned gown, young male doctor in dark blue scrubs, modern medical equipment, indoor setting 2:06
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Bedside love songs from the singing nurse

Before anyone called him The Singing Nurse, Jared Axen just sang in the hallway while he passed out medications. Nobody thought much about it, he says, not even him. more

Then patients would come out of their rooms to listen. That was when he began to see the singing as a way to make somebody's care personal, "to be able to touch them a little bit." Before long, patients were asking for songs, and it became part of his daily routine.

A young man with curly blond hair and an earring looks toward the camera in an indoor room. A headline runs in white letters across the lower third.Save
Jared Axen started singing while he passed out medications, and patients came out to listen.

His songs are the old ones, Broadway classics and love songs like "Time after time," sung in a soothing voice. "When he looks at you, you know he's singing to you," one listener says, "and it just pierces my heart."

In one hospital room, an older woman lies in bed in a yellow gown, an oxygen tube at her nose. Jared holds her hand and sings to her, and his singing brings her to tears.

An older person lies in a hospital bed in a yellow gown, with an oxygen tube near the nose. A headline runs in white letters across the lower third.Save
Jared sings to an older woman resting in her hospital bed.

For Jared, that personal touch is the job. "It's easy to turn on a TV and walk away," he says, "but it's personal if you can sit down, talk with them, sing with them, tell them some jokes." Anything that keeps a patient's mind off the pain while the medicine kicks in is worth doing.

Even on a bad day, he says, if you can make someone feel just a little good, you can change the day. He has seen what it does. Patients ask for less pain medication because they have less pain, and fewer need mood stabilizers. They may not be happy about where they are, but it seems a little easier to handle.

Elderly female in a hospital room with yellow floral-patterned gown, young male doctor in dark blue scrubs, modern medical equipment, indoor setting. The headline runs in white letters across the lower third.Save
Before anyone called him The Singing Nurse, Jared Axen just sang in the hallway while he passed out medications.

Then comes another old standard, "I'll be seeing you in all the old familiar places." People who hear him tend to answer with stories of their own, often from nurses who sang to their patients too. And they keep mentioning his tenor, and the way he holds her hand while he sings.

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