Stories of Impact
Meet our Volunteer of the Year, James Lafferty from Ennis
Dec 2, 2024
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James has volunteered with the Irish Red Cross branch in Ennis, County Clare for fourteen years. He is passionate about the patient transfer service the branch provides for the people of Clare. One man we support regularly is partially paralyzed. He lives with constant chronic pain and needs his morphine implant to be refilled every six weeks at a hospital in Dublin. Not having that done would have life-threatening consequences for him. That’s a more complex transfer, it requires a stretcher and vacuum mattress to support the patient and to minimise movement.
James has led fundraising efforts for three community vehicles for the branch. One of them is a multi-purpose bus with 15 seats which can be removed to accommodate up to three wheelchairs or a stretcher.
There are a lot of older people who are isolated from the local community. They often don’t have a way to get to hospital appointments. We help them.
We pick people up from their homes across the county stretching as far as Gort and Ballina and our volunteers drive them to vital medical appointments in hospitals all over Ireland. This is all done by volunteers at no charge to the patient. We get referrals from social workers and other local services. People know about our service now and call to ask us to help a family member or for help for themselves. The demand for the patient transfer service is huge.
Last year, James and his fellow branch volunteers gave more than 8,000 hours to help with patient transfer and other local community support services.
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