CHI St. Vincent Hot Springs helped celebrate EMS Week, May 15-21, on Wednesday by blessing local EMS workers, their helicopters and vehicles, while also feeding them lunch.
From 11 a.m. until 2 p.m., nurses from the hospital served barbecue lunches to the EMS workers, and at 11:30 a.m., Michael Millard, market director of Mission Integration for the hospital, blessed the workers.
"Well, we do it, No. 1, because we want to give thanks to these folks who sacrifice of themselves so much every day. Secondly, it is a true honor to be able to bless them. To be able to give them God's guidance and protection as they go out on the roads and do what they do," Millard said.
"It's a real honor, I mean it's a pleasure for us to be able to do that because we do this all the time for the folks within the hospital, but, as I say, they're the face and the hands of Christ ministry out in the community and it's important for us to say thank you for that," Millard said.
"We are, as part of EMS Week ... celebrating our emergency services personnel in the community, so we're having a barbecue today and just saying a special thank you to all our special agencies, whether it be air or ground," said CHI St. Vincent Hot Springs President Dr. Douglas Ross.
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"So just part of our heritage, obviously as Catholic health care and being part of the healing ministry of Jesus, it's something we do very commonly is we bless parts of our organization and our ministry and we want to bless the EMS teams today for not only as a thank you for the work they've done but going forward to bless them and protect them in their days and weeks ahead," Ross said.
Both Millard and Ross noted how important EMS workers are to the community.
"The No. 1 reason is like I was saying (in the blessing), they meet people in the moment when those folks are having the worst day of their lives. It's a car accident or a heart attack or stroke or something like that. They're the face of healing, of Jesus Christ's healing ministry, and that very often times, I know from experience, is such a comfort, knowing that there's somebody there that's going to help them right in that moment and to help get them to the hospital so they can get the kind of care that they need," Millard said.
"Certainly my background is an emergency physician and often times the emergency room and our EMS are our front door for health care. A lot of people's first experience with the health care system is oftentimes with EMS personnel or emergency departments and that's a critical part to get health care and quality health care started on the right path, so the EMS teams in our communities do a fantastic job in helping to facilitate that care and they're really a blessing to our community," Ross said.
Michael Millard, market director of Mission Integration for CHI St. Vincent, blesses EMS workers and their vehicles as part of EMS Week. - Photo by Tanner Newton of The Sentinel-RecordMillard noted that as this is EMS Week, "every day we've had some kind of a different celebration for them. I think one day was root beer and chips and we're giving out T-shirts, and you know, basically just letting them know that every time they come here, we really appreciate them and we're saying thank you in any way that we can," Millard said.
"We've got lunch today. The last couple of days we've had snacks and ice cream. The rest of the week we're going to continue to do some things so we want them to feel very, very special this whole week," Ross said.
"It's been an incredible journey, the last couple of years especially through COVID, for not only folks in the hospital but also our first responders, our EMS agencies, and they have rose above again and again to meet the needs of the community, and we just wanted to say a thank you for that service," Ross said.