Nurses at UT Medical Center make a bride’s dream come true

How long does it take to plan a wedding? For some nurses at the University of Tennessee Medical Center, it took four hours.

Samantha Barry and Phillip Bastelica were supposed to get married in August 2025. But Barry’s mother, Lynn, had been battling a terminal illness for some time and in December 2024 was released from the progressive care unit to hospice care. Since it was unlikely she would make it to the planned wedding, the wedding came to her.

Barry had her dress, so that was taken care of. Bastelica ran to Walmart to buy a suit. At the hospital, a team of nurses swung into action.

“I called dietary and was like, ‘hey, we need a cake,’” Shailee Dowdy, the team leader nurse on the progressive care unit, told Knoxville’s WATE-TV. Nurses headed to the gift shop, called the marketing team so they could take photos and grabbed a hospital chaplain. “Here Comes the Bride” played on a nurse’s phone when Barry’s father walked her down the aisle, while a nurse made sure to FaceTime in Bastelica’s family.

And Lynn? She was in the front row of the Absher Chapel for her daughter’s wedding day on Dec. 23.

“It’s the patient, but it’s also the family,” said nurse manager Kayla Daugherty. “When you go to nursing school, you don’t think you’ll plan a wedding, but that was really important for the patient and family that day.”