KINGSTON – Dialysis patients
returning from a long holiday weekend were met with an unexpected surprise
Tuesday at the dialysis center on Albany Avenue in Kingston.
Red Hook High School senior Jennifer Rowland was on hand to greet them with surprise gift bags filled with items to make their long treatments more comfortable.
About 140 large red beach bags occupied the waiting area, each stuffed with a handmade fleece poncho, magazines, and other gift items designed to comfort the patients. There is a bag for every patient, who must endure long blood treatments three times a week to stay alive.
Rowland surrounded by red bags …
… and giving one to a patient
Rowland’s father Ronald, who passed away, was once a patient at the Kingston clinic. His daughter prepared the gifts in his memory, and also to fulfill the Girl Scout Gold award requirement, similar to an Eagle Scout badge.
“My father was a patient here, before he passed away 11 years ago,
in May 2005,” Rowland explained. “He always said it was freezing
in there because they had to keep the machines warm.”
Dialysis patients feel cold when their blood cycles outside their bodies via plastic tubes through the filtration machine, which creates an uncomfortable air conditioning effect inside their bodies.
Rowland has been fashioning the ponchos since last summer, with the help of her grandmother. They are specially designed to make it easy for dialysis patients to keep warm, while being resistant to accidental blood stains.
Next year, after she graduates, Rowland plans to attend College of Mount St. Vincent in Riverdale to become a nurse practitioner, and eventually a nephrologist. “I want to be a nurse in my father’s memory,” she said, choking back tears.
“There’s a lot of people who feel very grateful for the care they receive, and they give back in different ways,” noted Gerry Harrington, marketing director of the Health Alliance of the Hudson Valley, which owns Kingston Dialysis.
Harrington added that a 16-year-old boy recently gave Christmas presents to every patient in the hospital, because he was a sickly child growing up, and received a train set while he was hospitalized at the age of six.
For information on organ donation visit www.liveonny.org
