Volunteers Indispensable

I applaud your July 25 Valley View article, “Hard Work, Late Hours, No Pay,” by Michael Szymanski. Volunteers are a vital, integral resource of every hospital and never receive enough recognition for their contributions.

Although Tarzana Regional Medical Center was not contacted for the article, we do have a volunteer staff some 200 strong, ranging in age from 12 to 88 years. Combined, they have contributed more than one-half million man-hours in the delivery of health-care service to the community utilizing our facility. Nine of our volunteers have been with Tarzana since we opened 18 years ago and one volunteer has single-handedly donated more than 14,835 hours!

All of our volunteers are special. Among our volunteers are our husband and wife teams; a volunteer who works two shifts a day and our “handi-abled” volunteers.

Volunteers would be sorely missed at the Tarzana Regional Medical Center, just as they were in your coverage of hospital volunteers in the Valley.

ROGER DRUE

Drue is chief executive officer of the Tarzana Regional Medical Center .