WHEN the Griffith Base Hospital is in need of some added supplies or a new machine, it’s the auxiliary volunteers who ensure funds are raised.
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President of the hospital auxiliary Heather Eagleton was selling raffle tickets on Monday and was more than happy to have a chat about what she and the other volunteers do.
“We're selling tickets for the hospital auxiliary and the money goes towards buying supplies for the Griffith Base Hospital,” she said.
“There's a thing they're needing for the second operating theatre which is called a stack, I don't know what the full name of it is though and we're putting $56,000 towards it, but we don't pay the bill until it actually arrives at the door.
“So mostly we buy things that they need in the hospital.”
Despite the timing of the raffle coinciding with the week leading up to the NSW state election, Ms Eagleton said was just a coincidence.
“It just so happened to be that the state election was right around the corner, just a big coincidence really,” she said.
“We're only selling raffle tickets here for a week this time and we've got a street stall where we sell cakes and things like that down on the corner and that will be there on Friday.
“We'll also bring things down from the kiosk like knitted blankets, bonnets and all kinds of kids stuff.
“We've got quite a few volunteers who work with us, doing shifts at various times.
“There’s a morning, afternoon and a night shift and we usually have just one or two people on at a time.”
Despite the lack of government funds coming in, Heather and the rest of the volunteers always stay upbeat about things, realising that there are other organisations that don’t receive enough funding either.
“Well there is lots of things that they don't give enough money towards but we've been doing it for years now,” she said.
“We mostly get money from selling raffle tickets, the Easter and Christmas raffle.
“We've got a hospital kiosk that people work in with the three different shifts and it's all done by volunteers so that's mainly what we get our money from, we have a springtime lunchin as well.”
Despite her years of volunteer work with the organisation, Ms Eagleton was quick to note how help is always needed and appreciated.
“I’ve been doing this for over 20 years now, I’ve never done work in the hospital, it’s all just volunteering,” she said.
“It's great that the pharmacies allow us to set up outside as well, they let us leave our equipment in there overnight and that just makes things so much easier on us,” she said.
