By Rev. Vickie Hedlund
Apr 12, 2024
This week the staff of Olean General Hospital celebrated the addition of two comfort care rooms and a family room, located on the second floor of the hospital.
Comfort care rooms are reserved for patients who are nearing the end of the life and they have made the decision to no longer receive treatment intended to cure them. Rather, the focus will be on keeping the patient comfortable and pain free, thereby providing the best quality of life possible until they pass. An example of this might be a repeat cancer patient who has chosen not to go through the rig-ors of chemotherapy and radiation again.
Previously, if a private room wasn’t available a comfort care patient may be placed in a regular room with a roommate and very little space or privacy for family members. Now, the goal is to make the new comfort rooms available as often as the patient census allows.
These new rooms have been made possible by the family of Rose Schwabenbauer. After Rose passed away in August of 2022, her son Bryan felt led to honor his family’s tradition of helping others by making a sizable contribution to the hospital, with the hope of making the comfort care process a better experience for others.
As a result, rooms 209 and 212 were freshly painted and now contain only one bed along with amenities such as a sofa, a small refrigerator, a Keurig, etc. A smaller room which was previ-ously used as an office, will now be used as a quiet space for family members to gather when they need to take a break. This room will provide privacy for them when discussing sensitive topics like funeral arrangements or medical concerns with-out the patient being able to hear.
On Tuesday of this week, Bryan Schwabenbauer, his wife Kelly and children Gunner and Angeline were honored in a special ceremony in the atrium on second floor. The cer-emony was organized by Steve Jackson, President of the Olean General Hospital Foundation and one of the speakers was Dr. Gregory Hare, who cared for Bryan’s mother for an extended period of time. The family was given a tour of the comfort care rooms and a plaque was unveiled outside the family room. At the request of Bryan, the plaque reads, “In loving memory of Mom and Dad, Ben and Rose Schwabenbauer, Dedicated to putting God, Family and others before themselves.”
April 16 is National Health Care Decisions Day, a day chosen to educate the public and health care providers on the importance of advance care planning. As a hospital chaplain, I realize how vital it is to decide what types of care you want to receive while you still have the capacity to do so. This saves grieving loved ones from having to shoulder that burden during an already difficult time. Please consider put-ting your affairs in order, as it will bring you peace and your loved ones will be thankful you did.