National Volunteer Week: Celebrating Volunteers and Patient Family Advisors

A message from Dr. Rhonda Crocker Ellacott, President and CEO, Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre and CEO, Thunder Bay Regional Health Research Institute

Volunteers and Patient Family Advisors are vital to our organization.

Each year, during National Volunteer Week, we make a special effort to recognize the valuable contributions of hundreds of volunteers who give generously of their skills, energy, and everyone’s most valuable resource – time.

Volunteers come to give back to the Hospital and the Health Research Institute to support us in an advisory capacity, or help out with fundraising.

While volunteers represent a wide array of ages and backgrounds in our community, they all have one thing in common – they make a tremendous impact on the experiences of patients and families from all over Northwestern Ontario.

Thank you as well for being our finest ambassadors, not only within the Hospital and Health Research Institute, but also in the community.

I would like to recognize our volunteer Board Members. Thank you to all of our Board Members who so generously share your time, your energy, and your skills to enhance our patients and their care partners’ experience and the Hospital’s programs and services. Thank you to all of our Board Members with the Health Research Institute who commit to advocating for our Mission to be an international leader in health technology research and other strategic health innovation, that improves the health of the people of Northwestern Ontario and beyond.

Before the pandemic, hundreds of Volunteers and Patient Family Advisors were active in countless ways to support patient and family centred care at the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre, the Thunder Bay Regional Health Research Institute and Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Foundation. Fortunately, for our Hospital, a few of those volunteers have been able to continue volunteering on-site, remotely, or virtually.

I would also like to acknowledge those who stepped back from volunteering this year to protect themselves and others, either due to personal choice or in large part because our Hospital, like most in Ontario, limited most or all volunteer activity during the pandemic. As Volunteer Canada says, “The value of one person staying home helps protect their network, the power of many people keeping their distance helps protect the community.”

Thank you for everything you do to support our Hospital and community.