Students deliver custom holiday cards to hospital patients
The next generation of medical professionals might not be ready to deliver health care just yet, but they found a way to deliver a different type of care just before the holidays.
About 20 or so members of Butler Senior High School’s Medical Careers Club gathered Tuesday, Dec. 23, at Butler Memorial Hospital to distribute around 1,500 holiday cards to patients. Each card was handmade by students of all eight of Butler Area School District’s elementary schools.
The initiative was first created and spearheaded last year by Reese Sequite, a junior at Butler Senior High School. She said she pitched the idea to the principals, who were more than glad to assist.
“They love to support this. It’s a good thing and it gets the schools involved,” she said. “It also gives the art teacher something to do on the last days of school.”
She said the support the program received last year made her certain she would do it again. This year, cards will be distributed at Butler Memorial as well as Clarion Hospital, Sunnyview Rehabilitation and Nursing Center and VA Butler Healthcare.
“A lot of patients were so grateful. One of them, last year when we went up to Clarion, she was in hospice and only had a week left. They said that was the first time they saw her smile for days,” Reese said.
Last year’s distribution saw Reese joined primarily by members of the swim team. Since then, however, she founded a Medical Careers Club at school.
“I was looking at how established other clubs were and how we had stuff for engineering and stuff but never had anything really for health care,” she said. “So many of the kids go to BC3 and we have this great connection with Independence Health System. I was like, ‘why do we not have something for the health care field?’”
She said she knew she wanted the club to take over the card distribution, as it would give them actual field time in a real hospital. She said she hopes to become a doctor after she finishes school, but has yet to decide on a specific practice.
Before the students began giving out cards, Reese took a moment to remind them of some core principals of medical ethics, such as patient confidentiality.
Leslie Walters, chief nursing officer at Butler Memorial and Clarion hospitals, said she is thrilled to see someone as young as Reese make a gesture for patients like this. Between Reese and her club mates, Walters said she feels the future of the profession will be in good hands.
“It’s exciting. (Reese) told us last year that she wanted to be an ER doctor and she’s telling us she still wants to be a doctor. We need health care workers. We need nurses. We need doctors. We need paramedics. We have an aging population, so it’s really exciting to see people taking an interest in health care,” she said.
