The BEST EVER CAMTA Warehouse Packing Bee

It's NOT an exaggeration!  Before 10 AM this morning the Deb Chalupa opened the doors to the warehouse and started mulling her lists.  Then soon thereafter Dan, Betty, Eileen, John and more and more CAMTA members arrived to get underway on the major packing bee before our departure for Ecuador.

Here's the Physios sorting through a big pile of crutches and walkers.  The crutch drive via Twitter resulted in about 8 pairs but there were many more collected from other sources.  The Physios had several large hockey goalee bags packed by the end of the afternoon.

In the storage area of the warehouse, Heather and Eileen paused for a laugh.  Heather is the charge nurse for the Adult OR and Eileen is likewise but for pediatrics.

While Eileen and Heather were in the back smiling, Nicole, Jazz and Barb were busy with ward items.  Nicole  is a translator and Jazz is a student.  Barb is the CAMTA Treasurer.

Linda Lee, Heather and Anne are the three most experienced adult operating room nurses.  They've been at it since I was a junior resident.  Here they consult about the items still to be procured.  For instance we have to source bone cement in Ecuador.

Here's medical student applicant Asha and Debbie.  Asha is participating for her second year as a translator.  Debbie is the charge nurse for pediatric orthopedics at the Stollery Children's Hospital.  She is participating for her third time and will be there again for the two full weeks of surgery.

The main point of the packing bee is to get the supplies into these hockey bags!!

We got about 39 bags loaded of about 55 total.  The contents have been itemized and now Dan Ducholke will finalize the spreadsheet of items before we send that list for approval to Ecuador.  Dan is participating for his second year and as an engineer he understands process well.  That's why I called today's packing bee the "Best Ever".  It's because we locked the doors at 3:30 PM instead of 9 PM!!!  All due to an organized and planned packing process.