Hard Work

I volunteered today and remembered an incident that happened last week at volunteering that I had forgot. Last week I worked with 2 current medical students who, for one of their course credits, had to spend 2 week sin the hospital rotating through different jobs and learning about the hospital. When I was volunteering last week I was wroking with 2 students. Our job was to make packets for thethe Labor and Delivery unit. Saint Luke's is unique from the hospitals that Nathan and I have worked in before in that paperwork for admitting, patient care, births, deaths, and any mailings that need to be done for any department can be "ordered" through tthe volunteer office, rather than each unit being in charge or preparing their own packets. It can be a tedious job but it's very important. The two young women/future doctors I was working with didn't see the value and in my most polite voice told them how impportant it was to see the background work so that when their time came to provide care in a timely fashion, this resource would be there - because of volunteer work. They were stunned that I would talk to them, after all, I'm JUST a volunteer.

It upsets me when people look down on volunteers. These are people who are giving up their time for no reward to help others. On top of that, many have worked at the hospital for years prior to volunteering and they love their hospital so much that they still want to give even after retirement. I hope that after what I said those girls take a minute to realize the hard work of the SL hospital volunteers.