Even during a public
health crisis, hospice and palliative care professionals rise to the challenge
of providing compassionate, person-centered care in the community. What is
equally powerful is seeing hospice volunteers and members of the community do
the same.
NHPCO thanks
Jennifer Matlack, Marketing and Public Relations Manager for Regional
Hospice in Connecticut, for sharing this #hapcFacesofCaring story about Marion, who stepped up to a call for masks.
Like everyone else, we are grappling with low PPE inventory.
As a backup, we put a call out to our volunteers, asking for people who could
sew masks for us. Many have. We have about 300 now with more coming in. One
woman, Marion, who sewed for us is not a volunteer but rather heard about our
plea via a friend.
She ended up sewing about 20 masks for us and confided that
being able to help in this way was really a release for her. She is a cancer
survivor and at first was very hesitant about helping, as the nature of what we
were asking kicked up past struggles with her health. She wrote to me after she
made her masks for us, saying, “Asking me to do this was hard at first, but
after I got done, you set me free.”
“I was a cancer patient and I have been diabetic for 50
years, so sometimes getting involved with health issues others are facing
brings huge compassion yet revives my own grief and frustration. That being
said, to pay it forward is a gift, as I would rather be on the giving end than
receiving,” Marion wrote.
Like so many other hospice and palliative care providers,
Regional Hospice is grateful for the outpouring of support we have received
during this public health crisis.
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