Susan Stabb swung by the local Dollar Store to buy stickers ahead of her Thursday shift at the Sperling Drive vaccination clinic.
“We’ve just started doing the five to 11-year-olds,” explained the Barrie nurse who came out of retirement to help out during the current health crisis.
She began early in the pandemic working remotely for public health in Hamilton, and switched her focus to Barrie’s COVID-19 immunization clinic when it opened in the former Barrie police building on Sperling Drive.
With children now getting the shots, Stabb, who spent the bulk of her career working at the Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre, wanted to help make them a little more comfortable.
So she has set up a green board in the vaccination area where kids can affix stickers and little flowers after their jab, helping to create what she calls a 'garden of good health.'
Stabb is among a cadre of medical staffers who have come out of retirement to lend a hand during the pandemic.
Hospitals and other medical services have been challenged to maintain full employment as demands resulting from the spread of COVID-19 persist. And many services, including the immunization clinics, are operating largely through the extra help.
“We could not have made it through this pandemic without these retired health-care professionals putting up their hands and saying: ‘We’ll come and help,’” said Amy Wardell, who has been managing the Sperling Drive facility for RVH since its inception as a COVID-19 testing facility that also became a vaccination as well as cold and flu clinic.
Laurie Stanford was among those who couldn't help but pitch in when the mass immunization clinics were being set up during the height of the pandemic.
“I worked in immunization at the health unit for 25-plus years,” said Stanford, who retired from the Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit and then worked in a travel clinic before retiring.
In fact, she had experience working in a large immunization program at the start of her career in Hamilton when the community encountered a small polio outbreak more than 40 years ago.
“So I thought: ‘I have something to offer here, and I am retired and I’m not doing anything else,” said the Oro-Medonte Township resident.
Having given up her licence, Stanford had to jump through hoops to get it back in order, which took several weeks and many phone calls and emails.
And just about a year ago she went back to work, helping to administer vaccines when the Holly Community Centre, now the Peggy Hill Team Community Centre, was converted into a huge vaccination clinic.
“The very best part of it was talking to the people,” she said. “In five minutes people could tell you so much about their lives, on top of the important health information you might need to get from them,” she said. “That was, by far, the best part.”
She worked three or four days per week right into July and then happily returned to retirement as she prepared to welcome a new grandchild.
As for Stabb, whose husband died suddenly from cancer in December, she said she needs to work and contribute to the community as much as the community needs her.
“I think I’ll be doing it until they say we don’t need Sperling Drive open,” said the Barrie nurse. “It’s been an opportunity to give back.”
Just how long that will be, added Wardell, remains uncertain.
But as time goes on, the former retirees are becoming a more crucial part of the organization.
“Now about 90 per cent of our immunizers are retired,” said Wardell. “Right now we have… approximately 30 retired nurses on staff that work as needed.”
There have also been retired physicians.
At the height of the vaccination program, Wardell was managing a roster of about 120, including about a dozen retired doctors.
Calls would go out when the lineups got too long and Wardell found help was always available.
“They would drop everything they were doing and just come and help, even if it was for an hour. It was really moving,” she said. “People just wanted to help and these health-care professionals are exactly who we needed at this time and they did not disappoint.”
