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Published on 03/11/1996 All articles from this issue

El Camino Hospital Auxiliary helps keep the hospita

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l healthyBy Clyde NoelTown Crier Staff WriterOn any given day you can find more than 100 volunteers working at El Camino Hospital. It¹s their function to provide services for the well-being of patients and visitors. At one time they were called ³pink ladies,² but today they are called Auxilians since more than 100 of the 975 volunteers are men. The El Camino Hospital Auxilary volunteers are well informed ambassadors of good will. Their primary purpose is to make a patient¹s stay in the hospital as pleasant as possible and members help patients 12 hours a month in a typical four-hour a week stint. ³The Auxilians are the heart and soul of Camino Healthcare and El Camino Hospital,² said Gerry Sarnat, M.D., Camino Healthcare interim president. ³They are part of our network of services that we depend on day to day to function effectively. They contribute approximately 10,000 hours per month for patients and their families doing whatever it takes to make El Camino an outstanding community hospital. We thank our wonderful volunteers.² The Auxiliary was organized in 1958 before the hospital was built, and since then, more than 3.4 million volunteer hours of service have been provided by members in 23 different hospital and community services. During their 35-year existence they have left their mark on the hospital.³You can¹t have a rainbow without a cloud and a storm,² said Judy Van Dyck, Los Altos resident and president of the Auxiliary. ³At present there is a cloud and a storm going around us here in the hospital, and we are the sign of calm and hope. That¹s what I based my term of office on. That¹s also why our name tags have a rainbow on them.²Van Dyck, a registered nurse, started working in the hospital in 1962 at the information desk and as a hostess for the radiation therapy department. After several years she stayed home to raise two boys and acted as school nurse at Saint Simon School. Then in 1988 after her husband, a doctor, died she returned to the Auxiliary. ³I needed to get my life together and come back to a professional environment that I was familiar with. I worked as a surgical hostess and became director of the Junior Auxiliary and then president-elect the last two years,² Van Dyck said. Donna Dowell, a registered nurse on the floor, doesn¹t know how the hospital could do without volunteers.³Personally, we couldn¹t function without them. We form a personal attachment to them because we get to know them over the years. They handle the families who are waiting for their loved ones. That¹s an aspect of hospital care we nurses don¹t have to worry about. We know they are in good hands with the auxiliary,² Dowell said. Lois Thompson has been volunteering at El Camino Hospital every Friday for the last 30 years. ³I love it here. I¹m doing something for myself and something for other people. They needed help, the hospital was new 30 years ago, and I wanted to do my part,² Thompson said. Every patient who is discharged must be escorted out of the hospital by a volunteer. Some are wheeled out by escorts and others are accompanied to the door by auxiliary escorts. ³Patients tell us they were patients in other hospitals, but the treatment they receive at El Camino is royal,² Thompson said. Van Dyck is a member of the Strategic Planning Committee that looks at the future of the Auxiliary.³As a visionary, you have to grow to move forward and that¹s where the change comes into effect,² Van Dyck said. ³Change is that cloud in the storm the health care industry has created. As an Auxilian, we have to be prepared for change that may include going into the community to complete the auxiliary service.²