By Staff
NILES – In a special ceremony held Thursday evening at Lakeland Community Hospital, Niles, Lakeland Health Foundation officials announced the donation of a major gift by Niles resident Charles Huizenga in honor of his wife, Muriel.
Charles Huizenga will donate a total of $1 million to Lakeland Community Hospital, Niles, with $500,000 of the funds given outright and another $500,000 set up as a challenge gift for completion of a total renovation of the hospital's Obstetrics Unit.
"What I want to do is prolong Muriel's intentions to make the hospital ever more welcoming to their patients, their customers and their visitors," said Huizenga.
"Muriel Huizenga had great passion for insuring that the Niles area had 'Happy and Healthy Kids'," said Michelle Seymour, Lakeland director of development and president of the Lakeland Health Foundation.
"With the matching gift portion of this heartfelt donation, Mr. Huizenga hopes to encourage others in the community to also give to Lakeland to support this effort. Mr. Huizenga will provide a dollar-for-dollar match up to $500,000 to insure this program's success."
New mothers and their babies and children comprise a large portion of the patients served annually by Lakeland Community Hospital, Niles.
Since 2003, total annual births at the Niles hospital have increased by 20 percent, from 770 in 2003 to 927 in 2006.
Muriel Huizenga, who passed away in July 2005, donated her time and effort to Lakeland HealthCare for more than 50 years.
She believed that "there is no such thing as other people's children," and exemplified that truism through her volunteer efforts for Lakeland.
She gave more than 1,000 hours to the Lakeland Auxiliary, doing everything from making Christmas stockings for new babies to providing leadership as president of the Auxiliary.
Muriel also served on the hospital's board of directors for 11 years, and received the board's Distinguished Service Award in 1981.
"We are pleased to announce that Mr. Huizenga's initial gift of $500,000 will be used to improve health care for the children of Niles residents for years to come," said Joseph A. Wasserman, president and chief executive officer of Lakeland HealthCare.
"Plans for this generous contribution include using the gifted monies in a number of areas, including prenatal care, hospital care and community education."
The most obvious use will be physical changes planned for the obstetrics unit at the Niles hospital.
The rooms will be remodeled to reflect the "PlaneTree" philosophy of care, making the environment feel less "clinical" for new mothers.
Lakeland Community Hospital, Niles, is one of only two hospitals in Michigan to practice PlaneTree, a model that supports patient-centered care in healing environments.
The Muriel Huizenga Birthing Center, as the Niles Obstetrics Unit will be renamed, will also feature all private rooms, each with its own bathroom and shower.
In addition, a Central Fetal Monitoring System will be purchased with a portion of the initial gift.
This state-of-the-art system will allow nurses to visualize labor activity on more than one patient at the same time.
Therefore, if a nurse is in one room attending to a patient, it is possible to switch the screen to the activity of a patient being monitored in another room without leaving the first patient's bedside.
This system will also immediately notify the nurse of any potentially dangerous findings, and support timely intervention for the laboring patient and her baby.
The Huizenga donation will also fund a "Room in a Box" program for pediatric patients, which will offer child patients of the hospital and their parents an opportunity to decorate their room for their stay, creating their own "healing environment."
Age-appropriate decoration kits as well as books, toys, games and media entertainment will be available.
The local Family Resource Center, in partnership with Lakeland Community Hospital, Niles, will also be supported by a portion of the initial donation from Huizenga.
This program serves mothers and their children who might be high-risk due to limited resources.
A registered nurse, a nutritionist and a social worker will assist mothers with life issues throughout pregnancy, birth and the infant's early years.
A portion of the funds will be used to create the Muriel Huizenga Memorial Allied Health Scholarship Endowment Fund.
This fund will support scholarships given to students or current Lakeland Niles staff pursuing education in the field of obstetrics or pediatrics.
An additional amount will go into a small equipment fund to purchase items for the OB unit such as breast pumping stations, cribs for the nursery and infant security items.
Finally, an educational segment will be designated for staffing and materials to support a lactation consultant who will support mothers who wish to breast feed, and to expand community outreach initiatives through Lakeland's Center for Health Enhancement (CHE).
CHE will offer seminars in Niles on a variety of issues concerning young children and their families, and school programs promoting healthy lifestyles and careers in health care.
Lakeland Health Foundation, Niles, is a not-for-profit organization that provides financial support for programs, services and capital development projects for Lakeland Community Hospital, Niles.
Gifts made to the foundation aid the hospital in its ongoing commitment to compassionate, cost-effective, quality health care.