It's a good thing that brand-new nurse Landon Dutton learned where the code button was on his first morning at Parkway Medical Center in Decatur, Ala., because two hours later, he had to push it when a patient presenting with chest pain flat-lined in his presence. "I was the only one in the room and all of the sudden the patient's eyes rolled back and the monitor showed his heart stopped beating," says Dutton, who graduated from The University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH) with a BSN this past spring. "I was shocked, scared, overwhelmed, and in complete disbelief that this situation would occur on my very first day! But I pushed the code button and immediately started chest compressions." The patient ended up surviving, and Dutton's swift response earned him admiration from his new coworkers. "The nurses were impressed, proud, almost shocked that I was able to act quickly and do what was needed," he says. But while he felt "like a hero," he adds that much of the credit goes to the strong foundation instilled in him by the UAH nursing program.