Rashmi Malde - Barnet Hospital COVID-19 Response Volunteer Barnet Hospital has received a large number of generous donations during these challenging times. Rashmi is one of the volunteers who have been stepping up to help the hospital by sorting the kind donations and making sure they are distributed to all of the staff. She has been volunteering at Barnet Hospital for two years and decided to continue volunteering through the COVID-19 pandemic in this new role. Rashmi has shared some experiences and thoughts with us…
What do you do in your new COVID-19 Response role? My day to day activity involves helping to organise deliveries and donations coming into the hospital from local businesses, making up boxes of goodies and care packages for the wards and delivering them. Why did you decide to continue volunteering? After seeing the bravery, courage and sacrifice of all the Front line NHS staff and Key workers, I felt that I, too had a civic as well as a moral duty to help the charity who needed fit and healthy volunteers to assist them with the huge task of sorting and distributing the care packages to the staff in the hospital. Have there been any highlights in your new role? The highlight of my day is when I see a huge smile lighting up the faces of the NHS staff and their deep appreciation of the kindness and generosity of all the people who have donated to the charity. Rashmi also shared that… I'm bowled away by the extent of the kindness and generosity shown by individuals as well as business organisations during these uncertain and challenging economic times. I'm happy to be able to help and make a small difference.
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In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, volunteers and staff at the Royal Free Charity have helped to transform the Recreation Club next to The Royal Free Hospital into a free supermarket for staff at the hospital. Hospital staff can come to the Rec Club after their shift to collect essentials that they need for free! Also saving them needing to go to out to the shop after a long shift. The team of volunteers, led by the Rec Club manager Kelly, help to keep the shop open from 6.30-10am and 6.30-10pm on weekdays and 6.30-10am at the weekends. Volunteers help by receiving and sorting through deliveries of food and toiletries and re-stocking the shop between opening times. When the shop is open, the volunteers help shop visitors to find what they are looking for. The service is immensely popular and the volunteers at the Rec Club helping around 700 staff each time the shop opens! The volunteers also help to put together boxes of goodies to send to the Royal Free London Trust’s satellite sites so that all staff in the Trust feel appreciated. Beth, one of our volunteers at the Rec Club commented that the service is very impressive and a “major logistical undertaking, [which was] up and running in a very short space of time”. She said:
“I am delighted to have the opportunity to be useful and to help support the stand while they are working so hard in such difficult circumstances.” The help of volunteers is greatly appreciated by the staff at the hospital during their response to COVID-19 (coronavirus). It is wonderful to see a community pull together to support each other so generously through these challenging times. |