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BWH residents in the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine gather at Rosie’s Place to prepare and serve dinner.
What started as a fundraiser to provide one meal to guests of a local community shelter has turned into an ongoing team effort for BWH residents in the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine. On Jan. 30, 15 residents prepared and served dinner for women at Rosie’s Place, a community resource that offers emergency and long-term assistance to poor and homeless women in Boston.
Groups that volunteer to make dinner for Rosie’s Place guests must not only cook the meal, but also raise the money to buy the ingredients. The Anesthesiology residents did so by holding a bake sale in January.
“We were pleasantly surprised and humbled by the generosity of the department,” said first-year resident Nick Yeldo, MD. “The minimum amount we had to raise was $350, but we doubled our goal and were able to raise enough money to provide two meals.”
But it wasn’t over yet. After word got around about the bake sale’s success, John A. Fox, MD, a senior attending in the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, sent an email to the faculty in the department, challenging them to match the amount raised by the residents. His efforts brought in another $1,000 from the faculty for the Rosie’s Place volunteers.
“As physicians, we’re doing a lot to help people every day, but we’re so busy that many of us haven’t taken the time to volunteer since medical school,” said Antje Barreveld, MD, a third-year resident.
Residents from all three classes and one administrative support team member cooked a dinner of soup, chicken, potatoes and corn for Rosie’s Place in February. While part of the group worked in the kitchen, others filled the wait for dinner by hosting a Bingo game in the dining room.
“The women were so appreciative, and all of the residents seemed to be having a good time,” Barreveld said. “It was definitely worthwhile, and it was a fun way for us to hang out and bond.”
The Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine will return to Rosie’s Place in May, when a second group of volunteers makes dinner.
“We’re hoping that this volunteer effort becomes ingrained into our residency program,” Yeldo said, adding that they plan to make it an annual tradition. “People are excited to continue this, and the way it spread like wildfire throughout the department is exactly what we were hoping would happen.”