president's message

Volunteerism.  It’s what your medical society is all about. Each of us can volunteer our time to what we find interesting and engaging, what we feel passionate about, and what makes us feel like we are contributing to a better society. There are those amongst us who take this concept to a higher level. They stand out. Yet each of us is just as capable of contributing in lots of ways large and small. Sometimes that’s within the realm of medicine and sometimes we prefer outside interests.

 So those that standout in our minds have been honored as this year’s Health Care Champions. This occurred at the recent recognition of Health Care Champion’s held by the Thurston County Chamber of Commerce and the TMCMS. It was a lively and informative event and each person’s contributions were highlighted by a video produced by Mark Woytowich. He did a superb job not only in describing what each person had accomplished but also by how it impacted those around us.

There are different categories that each winner represents. There is not space here to replicate all the information, so I would suggest that you get a hold of the supplement to the Business Examiner. The winners are James Kaech for all the work he did in getting healthcare providers immunized against the H1N1 influenza virus, Dr. Beth Harvey for her work in tirelessly re-establishing a community based vaccine supply organization, Dr. Diana Yu for her work in multiple counties as their Health Officer particularly in helping us all through the influenza outbreak, Sea-Mar Community Health Center for providing a safety net for those without care, and the Mason County Children’s Dental Coalition for providing dental care to the kids there. Each of these individuals or organizations demonstrate what can be done on the local level by people who see a need, feel strongly about a particular cause, and who then ask the question “what can be done to help cure this problem?” It is absolutely amazing to see what each of these folks did.