RDHA annual report
- Details
- Published on Monday, February 29, 2016
By Lynn Madden
President
Riverdale District Health Auxiliary (RDHA) has 57 members. We meet at Rivers Kiwanis Courts lounge on the fourth Wednesday of each month, except for July, August and December. On average, we have 12 members at each meeting. The auxiliary is very committed in efforts to better serve the patients, staff and community of Rivers by supporting our health care facility.
Each year in January we send letters to the hospital, personal care home, rehab centre and medical clinic requesting a wish list from them for equipment or items they need but which are not provided by Prairie Mountain Health. We donated just over $10,000 for the requested items! We had a guest speaker, Kelly Jakubowski, on a foot care and how important it is, especially for diabetics.
In February the auxiliary facilitated three Alzheimer sessions using Telehealth equipment in Rivers; nine people attended each session. In April we assisted with a very successful Wellness Day in Rivers. There were two guest speakers: Dick O’Brien spoke on Personal Resiliency in Challenging Times; Wendy Sutton talked about Caregiving, a Family Affair. Both sessions were well attended. RDHA catered a free lunch for the 150 people who attended Wellness Day. Also in April, Michelle McFadden and Lynn Madden attended a regional meeting in Neepawa; the regional meeting will be held in Rivers this year.
May is our annual Florence Nightingale Tea. This year Super Thrifty put on a fashion show for us. We ran a bake table, fish pond for the kids, and put together several healthy food baskets for raffle; we cleared $2,300! We also held a yard sale in May and several members took part in Walk with Your Doc to promote exercise as part of a healthy lifestyle. The walk included students from both schools, teachers, educational assistants, Rivers’ police chief Bruce Klassen, two student doctors and Drs. Heather Nowasad and Mandeep Dahliwal. A few personal care home patients, looked after by staff, a few Rolling Dale clients, our recreation director Navi Gill, many local people and of course, our canine friend Maggie all walked. The Manitoba Co-operator ran an article on our walk and CTV Winnipeg rad a short video about it on their evening news. RDHA issued a challenge to other communities to do a walk; Baldur and Dauphin accepted our challenge.
In June we presented a $500 bursary to Ilse Verbruggen, a Rivers Collegiate student who is entering the medical field. We also donated $250 to Child & Family Services. We had Wilma Bell as our guest speaker; she told us about an accommodation facility in Winnipeg called A Port in the Storm. People going through medical treatment and who need to stay in Winnipeg can stay at this facility.
September is our annual ethnic food booths at the Home and Craft Show. This is a great fundraiser for us but it also entails a lot of work; members do all the cooking, set up and serving. We made $2,900.
In October we hosted an Alzheimer Coffee Break at Shelly Mom’s Kitchen; she graciously donated $1 per cup of coffee sold between 7 a.m. and 4 p.m. Five RDHA members poured coffee and raised $288.20 for the Alzheimer Association. Members also worked in October at two flu clinics held at Riverdale Community Centre.
The official opening of the new addition to our hospital took place in November. Rehab patients now have a beautiful dining and activity centre. Our pledge to this addition was $50,000; this money has been invested over the years with this goal in mind. To date, $27,745 has been donated to the building addition; reserve funds will be used for furnishings, etc. as needed.
Each year at Christmas we give small gifts for the patients in our hospital and fruit baskets to hospital staff and doctors. We donated a new craft cupboard to the hospital; it is always stocked with miscellaneous items for patients of visitors to purchase. The oak cabinet was made by John Plaseski of Rivers. The cupboard generated more than $700 for us this year; Debby Neely kindly looks after it for us.
Our volunteer hours total 3,900. We are proud of our achievements in the past year and we will continue with our work and dedication to this community. We are very thankful for the support of the people of Rivers and area, without which we could not be successful. We look forward to 2016 and what challenges it will bring.
