Tune of Triumph: Hospital serenades recovering COVID-19 patients with "Walking in Memphis" as they are discharged.

Call it a hometown anthem, or, better yet, call it a song of success. The GRAMMY®-nominated hit “Walking in Memphis” carries a uniquely powerful message when it resounds from the intercom at Methodist University Hospital, a major medical facility just a few miles down the road from St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. 

Staff members throughout the hospital – from surgeons and nurses to administrators and cafeteria workers – know exactly what it means.

It means there’s reason to celebrate.

It means, more specifically, a recovering COVID-19 patient has been discharged from the Memphis hospital.   

“Obviously, we love the song and thought it was appropriate to play,” said Sarah Farley, communications specialist with Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare, whose system includes Methodist University.

“The song represents so much – hope, teamwork, accomplishment and encouragement and celebration.”

Methodist Le Bonheur shared a video on social media of staff members dancing and singing along with the song after a patient from a nearby community in Arkansas was discharged. The song is “one way we acknowledge the triumph of overcoming the disease," the hospital’s post said, and it reminds staff members of the part they play in caring for COVID-19 patients.

Although the video shows the patient gliding through the hallways in a wheelchair, he no doubt felt, as the song says, like his feet were “ten feet off of Beale.”