Powell Valley Healthcare's surgical team provides a variety of operations and diagnostic services, allowing local residents to receive care close to home. The Powell Medical Foundation supports PVHC in numerous ways, including by helping fund continuing education for medical staff.

Photo courtesy Powell Valley Healthcare

Megan Pfefferle

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This time of year, we talk a lot about being thankful. We are thankful for our families, for our homes, our jobs, our schools.

We, here in Powell, have another reason to be thankful: access to a local hospital. Each and every citizen of Powell benefits from having local health care, regardless of where they receive their care. It would be difficult to find someone not connected to an employee or patient at Powell Valley Healthcare here in our community. 

What would it mean for your family not to have access to local medical care? How far would you drive with a sick or injured child? How often would you be able to see a loved one in long-term care?  How much time off work would it take to see your doctor somewhere else? Without an ambulance service, what would happen if, God forbid, you had a medical emergency? 

What would it mean for Powell if the hospital wasn’t here? How many working professionals would we lose? How many families would leave? How many do you know personally? How many small, local businesses would have to close their doors because there aren’t enough customers for their business to remain open?  

The Powell Medical Foundation views PVHC as an asset to our community, not only for our health care but for our economic well-being. Since 1983, the Powell Medical Foundation has been working to support Powell Valley Healthcare through education, advocacy and fundraising.  

Through generous giving, the Powell Medical Foundation has been able to support PVHC in numerous ways. In the ’90s we were able to help provide new furniture at Powell Valley Care Center. Because of donors, the foundation has paid for 3D digital mammography equipment which has impacted many local women. Baby Friendly PVHC has OB infant warmers due to PMF givers. 

Our donors have made it possible for the clinic to have eight new Staxi wheelchairs to give patients a safer and more comfortable ride. Buildings B and C have new laminate flooring, which is much easier to keep clean (and looks nicer, too!) for the safety and health of our patients. This impacts patients, providers and staff for oncology, cardiology, women’s health/OB, orthopedics, pain management and general surgery. What an impact this has had thanks to our generous givers!

Continuing education is at the heart of Powell Valley Healthcare. It is vital, in this fast-paced scientific and technology-driven world in which we live, to help our staff stay up-to-date. The Powell Medical Foundation helps by supplying scholarships to staff in order that your health care stays top-notch.

We, at the foundation, are thankful for Powell Valley Healthcare. Thankful for the new lives ushered in by our all-star OB team, thankful for the care and love given to our long-term residents.  

We are grateful for the life-saving actions of our ambulance, EMTs and emergency room teams, and for access to cancer diagnosis and treatments close to home.  

We are thankful for the dedicated, brilliant individuals who tirelessly care for our community, even when overworked, overwhelmed and exhausted.  We are thankful for the jobs the hospital provides and the stability it brings to the community.  

The Powell Medical Foundation is thankful for you. Thank you for your generous support over the years, funding education, equipment and infrastructure improvements that may not have otherwise been possible. Thank you for recognizing the blessing that is having a local hospital. Thank you for your continued support of our friends and neighbors who care for our friends and neighbors.  

(Maureen Walsh is the Powell Medical Foundation’s board treasurer, Caroline Kost is a board member and Megan Pfefferle is the executive director.)