CRMC Third Largest Donation In State Collecting Hospital Supplies For Ukrainian Refugees

Cookeville Regional Medical Center will send some five pallets of items to Poland for Ukrainian Refugees.

Director of Materials Management Melinda Poston said that the collection came at the request of TEMA and Governor Bill Lee to hospitals all across the state. She said that within four or five hours of her sending a mass email to the hospital, they had accumulated items from most departments.

“We’ve all seen the news of what’s been going on with the folks over there in the Ukraine,” Poston said. “And then that hospital being bombed and those poor kids and those mothers that were getting ready to give birth, and I think it’s just touched everyone.”

Poston said that CRMC’s donation is the third-largest in the state behind Nashville HCA and Vanderbilt hospitals. She said that the Tennessee National Guard is picking up the supplies Monday afternoon to deliver to Poland.

Poston said that she’s so proud of her team for coming together for this cause despite having a tough couple of years themselves.

“We initially went through the deadly EF-4 tornado, and then right after that without a break really we were inundated with COVID infections for the last two years,” Poston said. “And with that, there have been  lot of supply chain issues that’s been happening globally, it’s not just affected our hospital with incredibly high demand and struggling to get the supplies we need to just take care of our patients. So we empathetically knew and have felt what that feels like.”

Poston said that she feels immense pride for how much her team donated and how quickly it all came together. She said that it wasn’t something that she had to try to rally people to do. Poston said it was made simple by all of the departments wanting to do what they could to serve others.