For a fifth year, the annual Giving Hearts Gala will be held at the Coast Hotel & Convention Centre on Saturday, Feb. 3, to raise funds for the Langley Memorial Hospital Foundation.
This year’s goal is to raise $250,000 to expand the capacity of the hospital’s five operating rooms with ceiling lifts and Stryker surgical scopes.
A ceiling lift would help to reduce injuries to staff while assisting surgical teams to move patients from a bed, gurney, or wheelchair, explained executive director Heather Scott.
“Moving patients without a lift can result in sprains and slipped discs, joint injuries, back injuries, and chronic pain,” she added.
As the population ages, more arthroscopic surgeries will be performed at Langley Memorial, and Stryker surgical scopes give surgeons a clear image of a patient’s target areas, she noted.
In total, the Giving Hearts Gala has raised $905,000 from its past four fundraisers, which allowed the foundation to help senior mobility, renovate a spiritual space, boost the emergency room expansion, and purchase a baby incubator.
“We’re a community hospital with an exceptional surgical team and we’re leaders in the region for access to timely care, with 86 per cent of urgent surgeries completed within 28 days. These tools will build upon that excellence, make a huge difference in patient treatment, care, and recovery,” Scott said.
The gala, with the South Asian and broader community’s support, has improved the quality of care at the hospital, said gala co-founders Manjit Gill and Balraj Mann.
“Langley is our home. A happy home is also a healthy one, and when we co-founded the Giving Hearts Gala we could think of no better partner than Langley Memorial Hospital Foundation,” Gill and Mann wrote in a joint statement.
Scott added that the gala brings the community together and provides an opportunity for Langley to engage with people on the front lines of health care.
Tickets can be bought online for $275 each or $2,200 for a table of eight at lmhfoundation.com.
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