ASSISTING PATIENTS IN NEED THROUGH DONATIONS

When Lynne Mattison donates to The University of Kansas Hospital's Patients In Need Fund, she sees her contribution put to work on the job.

A case worker in Social Work at the hospital, she sees patients in need every day. She knows her contribution helps them with basic needs during and after their stay.

"I've used the fund to purchase bus tickets to get people home, and to buy a pair of shoes so they won't have to get on that bus with nothing on their feet but hospital-issued socks," she recalls. The fund also provides clothing for patients in need when they are discharged.

The same fund provides meals for family members who've frantically jumped into the car and followed their loved one's ambulance, perhaps for hours – only to realize they forgot to grab a purse or wallet.

A major use for the Patients In Need Fund is discharge prescriptions for uninsured patients, Mattison explains. The hospital also budgets toward this expense, but "the need simply never ends. And without those prescriptions, many patients will wind up right back in the hospital."