Fundraising push on for new hospital equipment
Bc
With the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance in much different shape than it was a year ago, the Foundation of CKHA relaunched its Diagnostic Imaging Equipment Renewal Campaign Tuesday.
The campaign, which has raised $4.5 million since 2014, is looking to bring in $2.4 million in the next six months. And it has brought on high-profile support to help it get there.
The Foundation named former CFL wide receiver and local sports icon Andy Fantuz as honourary campaign chair, while local builder and realty TV personality Dave Depencier will co-chair the campaign with CKXS radio general manager Greg Hetherington.
Candice Jeffrey, interim director of development with the foundation, said the campaign is raising funds for 18 pieces of diagnostic imaging equipment, including 13 ultrasound machines, a fluoroscopy machine and a CT scanner.
These machines serve almost every program offered at the CKHA, and are key for diagnoses including heart, stroke, cancer, orthopedics, rehabilitation, and obstetrics patients according to foundation officials.
“The equipment we have is effective, but considered out of date,” she said. “It’s reaching its end of life.”
More than 100,000 diagnostic imaging exams take place every year through the CKHA, an average of about one per citizen in the municipality.
Jeffery is happy to have the support of Fantuz, Depencier and Hetherington.
“We are excited to welcome Andy, Dave and Greg to our fundraising efforts,” she said. “Each of the chairs has a personal connection to the equipment we are fundraising for, and we are confident that their passion for our community will help us reach our fundraising goals.”
Fantuz said he is honoured to be part of the campaign.
“I know first hand how important it is in getting the proper imaging,” he said of diagnostic imaging services. “I’ve had it many, many times. A couple of times, it may have saved my life or at least my career.”
Fantuz, player development co-ordinator with the Hamilton Tiger Cats, spent 11 years in the CFL catching passes and taking hits from defensive players. In late 2016, he suffered a torn ACL and missed the final game of the season. He still amassed 101 receptions for the Tiger Cats.
He has played in five Grey Cups.
Depencier, of Depencier Builders, said the equipment upgrades actually attract people to the municipality.
“From the homebuilders’ industry alone, having the proper (DI) equipment brings people here and keeps people here,” he said.
He added it would take the community coming on board for the campaign to reach its goal.
“It takes all of you to make this campaign successful. It’s going to take a lot of hard work,” he said.
Depencier also appears in the reality TV show, “Reno My Reno,” where he and a team go in and improve on poor renovations to cottages.
Hetherington, a radio personality and no stranger to community efforts in Chatham-Kent, said he was proud to help out in order to give back.
“It’s about putting cookies back into the cookie jar,” he said. “I had to utilize the CT scan as I had a pulmonary embolism in my lungs. I’m putting cookies back to make sure the next person gets diagnosed and has access to the proper equipment.”
He added it’s a “very small cookie I’m putting back into a big cookie jar.”
Private funding for the equipment is necessary, according to Jerome Quenneville, vice-president and chief financial officer for the CKHA.
“The government doesn’t really provide dollars for equipment. That is why it’s so important for community involvement,” he said.
Dr. Main Yee, a radiologist at the CKHA, put the needs of the equipment in perspective. In terms of the CT scanner alone, he said he came to the alliance 25 years ago because it had a state-of-the-art CT scanner. In that time, it has been replaced once – 13 years ago.
“A CT scanner is so powerful, you simply cannot practise good medicine without it,” he said. “What we have now is more than three generations behind.”
Yee added the one they hope to purchase can scan a patient from head to toe in about a second, and can take 128 “slices” or images per second, where the existing CT scanner is good for about 16 per second.
The target completion date for the fundraising is March 31, 2018, Darrin Lopes, head of the foundation’s board said.
