HARD working health staff in Tully now have access to free meals for those times a shift goes longer than expected.
Through the Far North Queensland Hospital Foundation’s “Feed our Health Heroes” campaign, a freezer has been installed at Tully Hospital for hard working health staff to grab a meal as needed.
Tully Hospital Acting Director of Nursing Vicki Bright said the initiative for supplying food to Tully staff was “absolutely fabulous!!” “We’d like to issue a huge thank-you to the Hospital Foundation and Heat and Eat company for making this happen. Food will be available to all staff including Queensland Ambulance Service and Retrieval Services Queensland that do over-time, extra shifts and don’t get a meal break after hours,” Ms Bright said.
“Nursing staff often transfer patients to Cairns and this is a 6-8 hour round trip and they often miss out on a meal break and do over-time. Having access to these meals will make these trips more bearable if they know they can get a meal when they get back to Tully.”
Foundation CEO Gina Hogan was delighted to see the results of community supporting our health heroes.
“The campaign’s doing well. We kicked off with a $10,000 donation from the Northern Frontier Foundation and we’re now up to almost $16,000,” Mrs Hogan said.
“Because of the Foundation’s cafes, we’ve been able to distribute hundreds of meals to well-deserving Cairns and Hinterland Hospital and Health Service staff so far,” she said.
“We know many staff of the health service are under a lot of pressure. Some are working extra shifts, going the extra mile to care tirelessly for patients and they’re doing multiple days of on-call. In those circumstances, sometimes you don’t get time to cook a meal or go to the shops, so this is our way of giving those health staff a boost.”
Tully Friends of the Hospital Foundation, a subsidiary of the FNQHF, president Suzette Reis was very excited about the initiative. “We’re grateful to the Cairns community for kicking this off down here, but we’re eager to keep this going if we can, and we know the Tully community will get behind us. Being a small community, everyone knows someone who works at the hospital and we all know how amazing they are. We’re proud to support them in this way,” Mrs Reis said.
Heat n Eat Australia co-owner Chris Parsons was thrilled to be chosen to supply the meals for the special freezer. “I’ve spent time at the hospital, my whole family has. We’ve got good friends who work there. We think this is a great idea and we’re excited to be part of it,” Mr Parsons said.
To show our health workers you care, visit www.fnqhf.org.au/healthheroes
Photo: Tully Friends of the Hospital Foundation secretary Melissa la Spina with grandson Jonah Coppens, Tully Hospital Registered Nurse Clare Steptoe, Tully Hospital Clinical Nurse Amarpreet Kaur and Grace Parsons from Heat n Eat.
