The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

4 ------ a" ni" seme Set a | a sa ee Te a -- ! 1 } oT rn - 26 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Tuesday, April 19, 1988 Everyone knows the importance of cleanliness at a hospital--and Everyone expects it. But have you ever wondered who has the responsiblity of keeping Port Perry's Community Memorial Hospital clean? Who takes out the garbage? Who washes the floors? Who looks after the laundry? Generally, the people who do this, possibly the most labour- intensive work at any hospital, do so quietly. Nobody really pays them much attention--it's the doc- tors and the nurses who get all the glory (and the complaints). But without the Housekeepers, the hospital would literally cease to function. Finally, the government of On- tario has recognized the impor- tance of a Hospital Housekeeper, and has made this week Health Care Housekeepers Week. So if you happen to be in the hospital at all this week, take a look past the medicine, the white coats, and the cafeteria--take a mo- ment to watch a Housekeeper in action. Chances are, all you'll see is a blur, as these men and wom- en work pretty hard. How hard? Well here's a note written by a Housekeeper at Com- munity Memorial, and it says it ~ This week, pay a thought to health housekeepers all: "We are the Housekeepers at Community Memorial Hospital, Port Perry. There are 10 of us, three full- time and seven part-time.We try to keep our hospital clean, bright, and germ-free. To identify us, we dress in blue colours and wear a pin with our name and department on it. There is a housekeeper on duty from S a.m. to 12 a.m. Our jobs include daily cleaning of patient rooms, Emergency department, Operating Room, Physiotherapy Department, staff lounges and of- fices, and also picking up all gar- age. We have project work, which is housecleaning a room. This means washing walls and win- dows, stripping a floor and put- ting a floor finish on it. A hard job, but a rewarding one. One housekeeper is also respon- sible for picking up dirty linen and distributing clean linen. Our linen comes from a linen service in Peterborough twice a week. This means we also have to order enough linen for each day. As you can see, a housekeeper can always be busy. We are proud to be on the Housekeeping staff at Community Memorial Hospital, Port Perry, as we try to live up to our motto, WE KEEP IT CLEAN!" Senior citizens club The Senior Citizens met on Wednesday, April 13 at 2:00 p.m. The President opened the meeting and welcomed everyone. O'Canada was sung. The family of the late Ernie & Mrs. Healey gave a donation - in their memory a plaque will be erected with all chartered members names on it in their memory. Roy Grierson gave a report on / Durham Region Senior games. After the meeting the choir entertained us with several numbers. At 5:00 p.m. there was a pot luck supper which was en- joyed by all. We were all pleased to have Ethel Irvine with us again. Euchre was played after supper. There will be a euchre on Wednesday the 20th at 1:30 p.m. We wish all our sick a speedy recovery. Norma Moore manages a big smile, even though the vaccuum cleaner she is working with is almost as big as she Is. Vaccuuming isn't Norma's only task as a member of the housekeeping staff, but it's a common job. Mary Page, a member of the hospital's housekeeping staff, "carbolizes" a bed (not to be mistaken with "carmelize"", which may be more delicious, but doesn't apply to the concept of cleaning). While the housekeeping staff doesn't make beds (Mary says the nursing staff does that), they do "carbolize"--which Is simply wiping down the mattress with disinfectant after each patient. This week, by the way, Is Health Care Housekeepers Week. Wouldn't it be handy to have somebody like Ray- mond Found around your house. Mr. Found, lead hand of the hospital housekeeping crew, is pretty handy with a mop, and Is responsible for keeping those floors clean enough to eat off of.