On Wednesday, United Hatzalah’s Ten Kavod project of visiting the elderly resulted in the life of a Beer Sheva resident being saved.
This was attested to by the doctor of the woman whose life was saved.
Volunteer EMT and Ten Kavod participant Netanel Samich from Be’er Sheva took a number of students from the Makif Gimmel School on a regular visit to the old-age community center in the Bet neighborhood in the city. During the visit, Netanel and the students provided basic medical checkups for the elderly at the community center. During one woman’s checkup, which included checking her pulse, blood pressure, and glucose levels, the student who was performing the check alerted Netanel to the abnormal readings that he was receiving from the woman. They told the woman that due to the danger she was in that she needed to see her doctor immediately. The woman followed the instructions of the volunteers and went to her physician. The doctor found that she required immediate drug treatment to alleviate the potentially life-threatening situation.
After her treatment, the woman called Netanel to thank him and said: “My doctor just told me that your checkup resulted in my life being saved. Thank you.”
United Hatzalah’s Ten Kavod project is a country-wide initiative in order to prevent elderly people in Israel, many of whom live by themselves, from feeling lonely, depressed, and even getting sick or passing away without anyone noticing.
Last year in Israel 133 elderly people died in their homes without anyone knowing about it for days. The program works together with local social services to identify and assist elderly people and pair them together with trained medical personnel to provide them with a social outlet and basic medical checkup in their own home free of charge.
