Langley Memorial’s Whatever It Takes Fund

Fragile after a long hospital stay, an elderly woman faced an uncertain future. During her care at Langley Memorial Hospital, her husband had passed away. Without the comfort of family or friends living nearby, the prospect of returning to an empty home was daunting.

The hospital’s social work team response was swift. They tapped into a pool of resources from the Whatever It Takes Fund (WIT), supported by generous donors over the year 2022. Those funds helped pay for the woman’s private home care, grocery shopping assistance and home cleaning to maintain her health and nutrition while she gained strength at home.

This otherwise small gesture made an immediate and tangible impact on the woman’s life – and donor generosity made it happen.

Launched in 2013 by the foundation to support the work of Langley Memorial’s Social Work team, the Whatever It Takes Fund has helped to cover expenses for practical assistance that helps patients leaving the hospital for home.

Recipient patients are mostly vulnerable residents: seniors, new Canadians and people subsisting on a low income, and patients who lack the family or social networks that most of us rely on to cope after a health crisis.

Many need help cleaning their home, buying groceries, organizing medications, or arranging appointments, all practical everyday chores that help them regain their independence, as a bridge of sorts, until they can secure an income that will sustain them over the long term.

Without your generosity, numerous senior citizens, new mothers and vulnerable low-income residents would have suffered from great discomfort, hunger and pain after a hospital stay – and would have been at great risk of re-admission to hospital.

When you give to the Whatever It Takes Fund, you extend compassion to Langley’s citizens with complex needs. You honour their dignity and provide them with the essentials they need to get well, stay well and contribute to a healthy, thriving community.