BC Business
The Burnaby Hospital Foundation has been supporting the health and wellness of the Burnaby community for more than 60 years. As the fundraising arm of the Burnaby Hospital, the foundation ensures the continued improvement of hospital equipment and health services not funded by the government. Inseparable from this mission are donors.
“Burnaby Hospital is an important piece of our community and one that needs to be supported to ensure it has the best in service and technology,” says Cheryl Carline, president and CEO of the Burnaby Hospital Foundation.
The foundation is funded entirely by community support and reiles on donations large and small to reach its goals. Donor contributions cover approximately 47 per cent of the cost of Burnaby Hospital’s new medical equipment and additional dollars are put towards clinical education, hospital programming and community-wellness initiatives. Among these are senior support services like the widower peer-counselling program.
This year the foundation has set the bar even higher and committed $5 million in support of the Burnaby Hospital Renewal Project. This improvement initiative will add a mental health and substance abuse zone to the emergency department and consolidate outpatient services. The total cost is projected to be $14 million, more than one third of which is coming from the foundation. Corporate sponsors are an essential part of making large-scale projects like this one a reality.
The project includes the redesign of the emergency department, so that it will be able to provide specialized care for mental health and substance abuse patients—as well as the relocation of outpatient services, which are currently scattered throughout the hospital, to one designated area. Both elements of the project are large in scale and would benefit greatly from corporate support.
Each corporate partnership is a negotiated process so as to ensure the donated dollars are spent exactly where the sponsor wants them to be. “Some donors are very specific and want to be involved in the process, while others are happy to leave it to our discretion,” says Carline. “In those cases we put [the money] towards our highest priority needs.”
Corporate sponsors are the momentum, which turn big project ideas into action and Burnaby Hospital honours generous gifts with naming and dedication opportunities. However no donation goes unnoticed and all are celebrated on the donor recognition walls at different levels of the hospital.
The renewal project is at aimed directly improving the patient experience and will leave a measurable impact on the health of the community.