Carl Family Donates $12,000 to WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital Oncology Department
Photo by Derek Redd
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WHEELING - Mike Carl could not be more grateful for the treatment his late father Robert received and his mother in law Sharon Dize continues to receive from the WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital medical oncology department. It's not just about the clinical treatment, but simply the care and compassion both received by doctors, nurses and staff.
Carl and his family, owners of the Bridge Tavern Bar and Grill, wanted to find a way to properly show their gratitude. And they found a big way to do so, one that will help cancer patients for a long time to come.
The family, through fundraisers at the restaurant, raised $12,000 and presented that amount to the hospital's medical oncology deparment Thursday afternoon.
"It's just the staff and how they really care for the patients," Carl said, "the empathy and the kindness that they showed not just my dad, but the family when we came in. We're really blessed to have such a staff here."
Carl said the fundraisers actually were his dad's idea before he died three weeks before his 89th birthday.
"This was kind of his brain child," Carl said. "We reached out to family and friends, and thank you to our corporate sponsors who donated a lot of really nice gifts for silent auctions and live auctions. We had tip boards. We had raffles and we had a GoFundMe page as well."
Carl said it took only about five hours one evening to raise that $12,000. The money, rather than going into a general fund, is going directly to the oncology department. That way, he said, the department can use the funds to purchase something it really needs or really wants, something that it normally would have to budget several years to buy.
"It means a lot that they're helping us to continue taking care of the patients," Dr. Avila Lima, a medical oncologist at Wheeling Hospital, said. "It really warms our hearts that they've done all of this, something that will have a big impact in the lives of many, many patients."
Carl said the donation was the least the family could do after the care the hospital gave his loved ones.
"It's incredibly gratifying to do something like this in honor of my dad and my mother in law," Carl said. "We were really grateful we could pull it off."
And Lima said that level of care simply is what all cancer patients at Wheeling Hospital should be afforded.
"Our patients deserve that," Lima said. "The care that we give is because that's what they deserve. They deserve the best care we can give them. They're going through a difficult time and we're here to help them through this journey."