Welcome to the HemOnc Holiday Elves

10th Annual Holiday Stockings

for Chemotherapy Patients Project (2008)

 

 

Celebrating 10 Fun-Filled Years of Giving

 

 

We are University of Michigan Employee Volunteers & Friends

Sponsored by the

Division of Hematology/Oncology,

Department of Internal Medicine,

at the University of Michigan

Ann Arbor, MI

 

 

Going through chemotherapy can be tough enough. Imagine going through chemotherapy in the midst of a bustling holiday season when everyone around you is shopping and having fun. Michigan winters can be dreary enough without adding chemotherapy to the mix. Our mission is to brighten the holiday season for our chemotherapy patients. (The photo depicts our room full of stuffed stockings waiting to be delivered)

 

How We Began: In 1999 a young co-worker, Lisa, was diagnosed with cancer, so we came up with the idea of making stockings as a distraction from treatment. We filled the stockings with toys and gave them to our pediatric chemotherapy patients. The following year (at Lisa's urging) we also included our adult patients. The patient and family reaction was so positive that we have continued, each year sewing, filling and distributing more than the last.

 

Since then, the Holiday Elves have stitched over 4,126 stockings and mittens which are filled to overflowing. Items meant to bring a smile and help pass the time during chemotherapy treatment are included in the stockings (or mittens). Patients young and old alike receive this wonderful surprise over a two-week period in December (typically spanning the Kwanzaa, Hanukah and Christmas holidays) when they arrive for treatment.

 

The look on the faces of patients as they are seated for treatment and are handed this special surprise is something you'd never forget - faces beam and patients laugh in delight as they pull item after item from their mitten or stocking.

 

The recipients of this delight are patients at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center and the Ann Arbor Veteran’s Administration.

 

 

How You Can Help

Sewing Guidelines

 

Our Photo Gallery

See What It Means to our Patients & Families

Our Special Friends

 

           We're proud to be a part of The Michigan Difference

 

     

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