Kingston, N.Y. – August 10, 2015 – HealthAlliance of the Hudson Valley hosted a free Health and Technology Camp at the Mary's Avenue and Broadway Campuses for 23 local students from July 27 to July 31.
This innovative, week-long summer program sponsored by the Benedictine Health Foundation, provided10-12 year-old children with the opportunity to observe many different aspects of healthcare in a hospital setting.
"The Benedictine Health Foundation was honored to provide funding for the Health and Technology Camp at HealthAlliance hospitals," said Paul Beichert, Second Vice President of the Benedictine Health Foundation. "This was a truly memorable experience for the campers, their parents and the hospital staff. It's certainly one that exemplifies the Benedictine spirit of compassionate care for people in our community."
The Health and Technology Camp was organized by Charlene Cohen, Registered Nurse Certified and Nursing Supervisor at the Mary's Avenue Campus, and Estela Aquino-Woch, Registered Nurse Certified; with assistance from Amy McAden, director of volunteer and auxiliary services, and six teen counselors, 14-19 years old.
Campers were grouped together in "teams" and attended classes on CPR and summer safety, and received coaching in public speaking. The campers visited many clinical areas, such as nursing, emergency medicine, maternity, mental health, and pharmacy; as well as non-clinical areas, including security, engineering, and information technology. Campers also received an introduction to complementary patient services such as nutritional services, physical therapy, music therapy and pet therapy.
At the end of the week, parents and guests joined the campers for dinner and a special graduation ceremony. The campers shared their team research project with Powerpoint presentations on a healthcare topic they had worked on during the week.
"Keeping the students engaged was never a problem," said McAden. "We had the best group of enthusiastic kids who walked away with a bird's eye view of hospital life and a greater appreciation of the challenges in medicine."
For more information about attending the 2016 HealthAlliance Health and Technology Camp, please contact Charlene Cohen at 845.338.2500 ext. 4810 or Charlene.cohen@hahv.org; or Amy McAden at 845.334.4712 or amy.mcaden@hahv.org.
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