Hospital Staff Takes Christmas Cheer To Patients

Northern Advocate, 26 December 1940, Page 2

Hospital Staff Takes Christmas Cheer To Patients

No trouble was spared by the staff of the Whangarei Hospital to make Christmas for the patients something to be renfembered. On Christmas eve the staff sang carols in all the wards and in the Old People’s Home. In the evening. Father Christmas distributed gifts to all. For tho little people. 10.30 on Christmas morning was the exciting hour. Santa came then, complete with reindeers. and entered the ward to leave gifts on each bed. Balloons and other decorations lent a festive atmosphere, and pains and aches —even medicine —were meantime forgotten. Wards Decorated. All other wards were similarly treated, 'the women’s ward being daintily decorated with lemon and pink the predominating colours. An ambitious and singularly effective scheme turned the women’s surgical ■n ward into a tropical island scene. There were coconut palms there, with real coconuts hanging from them, and lockers were miraculously turned into lily ponds, with swans and cygnets and a representation of the Ugly Duckling. A patriotic note dominated the men's medical ward.

Navy and Air Force were represented in the* scheme of decorations, and lockers were flag-bedecked. Red tones prevailed in the men’s surgical ward.. All corridors were brightened with ferns, hydrangeas and palms. The chairman of the Whangarei Hospital Board (Mr. J. A. S. Mac Kay), and two board members. Messrs A. Clarke and H. Younger, were among the guests in attendance. Altogether. Christmas was a jolly time at the hospital, the trouble taken by the staff in planning and preparing the festivities being amply rewarded by patients made happy.