Hospice

CHESAPEAKE TREASURES, a secondhand store operated by Hospice of the Chesapeake volunteers, is moving to Severna Park's Park Plaza Feb. 4.Since opening in May, the shop has raised $20,000 for patient care and bereavement programs. For information, call 410-987-2003.Longtime hospice volunteer Pam Beidle of Beidle Insurance Agency in Glen Burnie has been elected to that organization's board of directors.She recently received national recognition when she wasawarded the 1998 Nationwide Insurance Community Service Award for dedication to civic causes.

Karen Feroli, executive director of Carroll Hospice and Carroll Home Care, recently was presented with the 2006 Sylvia V. Canon Humanitarian Award from the Community Services Council of Carroll County. The award is presented each year to an individual who initiates or sustains outstanding community service in Carroll County. Recipients demonstrate creativity, innovation and commitment that helps individuals throughout the community. Feroli has been with Carroll Hospice and Carroll Home Care for the past 10 years, while also serving as an advocate for the health and welfare in Carroll through her involvement in a variety of community activities.

HOSPICE OF THE Chesapeake opens Chesapeake Treasures, its new community thrift store, May 8.Chesapeake Treasures will be in the same location as the thrift store the Cancer Resource and Support Center used to run before it dissolved this winter and transferred its assets to the hospice."

Jeanne Gilchrist Vance, a thoroughbred horse breeder and owner who founded and financed the Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care in Towson so the terminally ill could spend their final days in a restful setting, died of flu-related pneumonia Sunday at her home in Manalapan, Fla. She was 68. Miss Vance owned the thoroughbred horse Lemon Drop Kid, an upset winner of the 1999 Belmont Stakes, and resided for much of the year at a Monkton farm she owned....

Hospice of the Chesapeake, which set up shop in a tiny office on Benfield Boulevard in 1979 to introduce hospice care to Anne Arundel County, has grown into an agency that has benefited thousands of terminally ill people and their loved ones.Now, the organization operates from recently expanded offices on Veterans Highway in Millersville and has announced plans for further growth: an inpatient hospice residence."Our hospice governing board has long recognized the need for a residence," said President Erwin Abrams, a key force behind the hospice's expansion.

TURNING TO A fresh page on the calendar - a new month, a new year, a new millennium - is a perfect occasion to shed old habits and slip into something more productive. You might try a new experience that gives you the opportunity to make a difference in someone's life. Become a volunteer. A list of the worthiest organizations in this county that function on volunteer power must include the Hospice of the Chesapeake in Millersville. Kathy Bourgard, director of hospice volunteer services, heads a team of about 320 volunteers - the number varying day to day - who spend a few hours a week helping others.

WESTMINSTER -- Step back in time this weekend to the days of damsels and dragons. Taste tidbits from kitchens of old, watch wizards weave medieval magic and join the hunt for the grail.Carroll County is inaugurating its own Renaissance Fair,sponsored by Carroll Hospice and the William Winchester Inn. From 9 a.m. to dusk Saturday and Sunday, visitors are invited to join the feast, fun and frolic on the grounds of the inn, at Bishop and Center streets."Renaissance is anything and everything, a real hodgepodge," said Julie Flaherty, executive director of Carroll Hospice.

A woman dying of AIDS came to York House Hospice in Pennsylvania "with her spirit intact" said Joy Ufema, the hospice director."She told me she would just like to go, but she was afraid she would go to hell for being a whore," Ms. Ufema told a group of about 75 nurses and other volunteers from Carroll Hospice."

IN TIMES of need, Carroll County residents tend to reach out, to be there, to care. At Carroll Hospice the concern is obvious. When a loved one is dying, the burden can be overwhelming. That is when hospice volunteers reach out with caring hands, warm words and a wealth of resources to share.L Now, Carroll Hospice is making a request for new volunteers.Based in Westminster, Carroll Hospice is a 10-year-old organization that provides support and care, in hospitals and homes, for the terminally ill and their families, and bereavement counseling after the loss of a loved one."

Patricia Savoy bends over a bronze plaque in a small Annapolis cemetery, sweating a little in the heat, her face exhausted by emotion.She doesn't have to worry now that her son's grave will be lost.When the single mother couldn't afford a marker for her 7-year-old's grave this summer, a county hospice and teen-agers from a local church joined forces to buy the plaque.Inscribed on the plaque, which rests in a green hollow at Pinelawn Memorial Park, is the 7-year-old's name, Olonzo Prather, the years of his short life, columns of roses and two entwined hearts.