Member Spotlight: Interfaith Humanitarian Sanctum, Inc.
IHS is the totally independent, nonprofit, non-religious, ALL-volunteer “go to” 24/7 public charity available to all UVA social workers and dedicated to indigent patients and family members who come to the UVA Medical Center from great distances without funds for temporary assistance for lodging, food, prescriptions, co-pays, travel and now pediatric clinic needs.
What is meant by an immediate need? It means a hotel room tonight in a place far from home. It means UVA Hospitality House or Ronald McDonald House is totally booked and an unexpected patient and/or caregiver arrives without adequate funds. It means being hungry now. It means having full-day meal packets for caregivers for under-funded parents waiting in Pediatrics for weeks and months as their child is being treated for a critical condition. It means having the refrigerators topped up at UVA Hospitality House to serve 30-60 completely destitute guests. It means a pain prescription filled now. It means having funds for gas to get home, or a bus ticket. It means having an infant car seat for an indigent family when leaving with a baby to return home. It means having infant clothing for that same child. It means renting an electric breast pump for an uninsured mother to properly feed a newborn. These are urgent matters which cannot wait!
When local church doors close at 5 PM, and no one answers until 9 AM for meeting these immediate needs, and no other charity or hospital resource is available or funded when a social worker calls, there must be someone or some group to respond for those in desperate situations. Working closely with UVA Social Staff, who screen and approve every recipient, IHS has in place an effective plan with a core group of volunteers to answer these unmet needs. We NEED your support for this challenging effort. Funding support this year has been from two consistent supportive churches (TJMC UU in Charlottesville and Christ the King Catholic in Abingdon, VA); 20 state workers who donate through the state CVC program; two (2) private monthly contributors; our core officer group of four(4) people; and one dedicated food grant from Bama Works Fund for Dave Matthews Band in CACF.
Visit our website and blog entries and see who is helping us, and how your participation through your church, school, scouting groups, clubs, banks and businesses for food assistance or funds can keep this marvelous opportunity vibrant and ever-responsive. We have NEVER SAID NO to a social worker. Help us keep it that way. Please click on the following link http://www.interfaithhumanitariansanctum.org and access our website for further in-depth information. Also, we encourage you to click on the "BLOG" tab in the main menu at the top to access the many heartfelt articles and stories published bi-weekly in our Interfaith Sanctum Blog.
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