A hospital is a sad place, especially when a child gets there for a month or two, but if the treatment lasts the whole year? The usual life is left somewhere behind, and the little man lives within the four walls of the state institution, and instead of friends, he has painful procedures, droppers, pills. In this article, we are going to figure out how to volunteer at hospital.
Why does the hospital need volunteers?
Every day is similar to each other when you are ill. The child and his mother find themselves in a kind of “social isolation”, learning to live a new life, not to lose heart, and believe that everything will be fine. And when you are in such difficult circumstances, it is quite difficult to keep positive and smile.
What do the volunteers do at the hospital?
Volunteers bring with them an everlasting positive, friendly care for little patients, and faith in their recovery. Volunteers will find out what families need, how they can help because it is very sad to realize that a person in a difficult situation can be left all alone.
1. Come and communicate with children as a volunteer and friend.
Coming up with all sorts of positive, cheerful activities – sculpting, drawing, singing, playing, in general, doing anything – positive, in order to distract children and their mothers from the gray hospital routine. Here your imagination can unfold for everything, the main thing is that your classes are bright, kind, and not very difficult, since after the procedures it is not always physically possible for children to participate in complex processes.
Sometimes medications, radiation, and chemotherapy affect children in such a way that, for example, finger motility or other sad phenomena can be impaired. You can make wall newspapers and hang them on gray hospital walls, a new one every week. Gallery of drawings about summer, about the sun, about space, about magical planets. Play pantomime together. Write a script and create a play. Many children are very embarrassed to wear masks, and they must wear them. Therefore, you can hold a master class on masks-on-going and decorate them with beads and drawings. Yes, there are many more things you can think of!
2. Come to children for training.
Children in oncological hospitals spend a lot of time. Therefore, volunteers who can come to children to teach them something are very much appreciated. This can be computer literacy, English (German, French, etc.), the basics of photography, and so on. And if you are a professional teacher, you can teach lessons on any subject.
Highly appreciated: primary school teachers; English and mathematics teachers for all ages; physics-chemistry-biology teachers.
3. Buy the necessary things for the hospital.
Many children and their parents stay in hospitals for a year or more, and sometimes they go to the hospital in the summer, not knowing the exact timing of treatment, and stay for the winter. It happens that families coming from afar lack some household items or clothing (for example, bed linen or winter clothes).
4. Help transport the child.
Hospitals often need help with transportation. It is impossible for children with severe weakening to use public transport, so the drivers can be very helpful here.
5. Chat with children.
Choose any child for yourself and write him warm letters, send inspiring quotes, fairy tales, just talk about your life! Children are always very happy with letters. Just do not remind in letters about illness and home because children miss their friends and family very much, and you should not remind about it again.
