Born on Christmas Day, Santa Staples was a masterful nurse who ran the operating room with military precision, showing up at 3:30 a.m. on her day off to handle a particularly complex surgery. Not one to suffer fools, she had a flintiness that could intimidate even the neurosurgeons. "These people get so sick. The ones that get sick get so, so sick. Every system in their body shuts down. Our last, last resort is to put people on a ventilator. We are only doing it now if we absolutely have to. And they’re not gonna fare well, usually, if they get put on a ventilator. Outcomes are not good.”