Changing Lives
by Ingrid Hoffmeister

Las Patronas: A Tradition Of Giving
August 7 will mark the 58th year of Las Patronas’ Annual Jewel Ball, this year with the theme Rhapsody in White. The Las Patronas chairs have been busy making preparations to ensure that, as usual, the evening is something memorable and lucrative. Throughout its rich history, the La Jolla-based philanthropic organization has donated more than $9 million to nearly 1,000 charitable institutions in San Diego. The Jewel Ball represents the most venerable of philanthropic galas, and last year the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club was the recipient of their first annual Spirit of Giving award. The award represents the decades of long support and partnership between Las Patronas and the club.

Fifty women volunteers from the La Jolla area help create and produce the annual Jewel Ball, which every year has a new theme, elaborate set, and décor to thrill 850 guests. These same women are accustomed to wearing the many hats that support the Las Patronas organization. They have trained grant teams that make on-site visits to organizations requesting funds, while assessing the needs and impact the grants will have on the San Diego community. Their grants are diverse and cover many critical areas of need.

At their 2003 annual beneficiary luncheon they successfully captured the essence and spirit of giving by presenting seven major grants to the Athenaeum Music and Arts Library, Breast Care Unit of the UCSD Cancer Center, Children’s Hospital and Health Center, The George G. Glenner Alzheimer’s Family Center, Saint Clare’s Home, Inc., Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and UCSD Regional Burn Center. Each of these major beneficiaries as well as 40 other organizations benefited from the $621,863 raised by the 2003 Jewel Ball and year-long fundraising efforts.

Las Patronas has a wonderful community of over 250 retired (lifelong members) known as advisory members who give ongoing financial and motivational support. Other important elements are the corporate, business, and individual donors who ensure that Las Patronas continues to be fruitful and successful.

A Big Gift For Small Patients
One of the beneficiaries of the 2003 grant was San Diego’s Children’s Hospital and Health Center Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) , a medical womb large enough to support and nurture 32 babies. With all its intricate high technology medical equipment, the NICU may not mirror the soft, mothering womb of our imagining, but it does provide a powerful counterpart. One element critical to an infant’s survival is the Ohmeda Giraffe Omnibed (a unit that combines an incubator and warming bed). This surrogate womb provides a stable environment for a premature baby to be cared for with as little handling as possible. The NICU has two of these beds, the second recently purchased with funds from the Las Patronas grant. Curled inside one is a four-week-old, one-and-a-half-pound baby boy named Jorge.

After Jorge’s premature birth at a hospital in National City, the doctor met with his parents to offer them two difficult options. The first, due to the high level of complications, was to allow Jorge to die. The other was to transfer him to the NICU knowing the high risk and the possibility of him dying. The parents chose the latter, wanting to give their son any chance possible. During those fearful and anxiety-filled days they watched as little Jorge struggled for his life. At home were his two young sisters and a mother who felt helpless and sad. She decided, as she couldn’t talk to him directly, she would write him a letter telling him he is a very strong boy and she is here to help him with his struggles. She thanks God and the doctors for their love and support and is very hopeful he will pull through.

To help me understand more about the NICU is Jennifer McFadden, R.N.C., M.S., C.N.S., a 20-year clinical nurse specialist who says, “When I started my career in 1985, babies like Jorge, delivered at 24 weeks (four months early) died because we couldn’t provide the right environment to keep them alive.” As I peer more intensely into the Omnibed, Jorge’s tiny head, smaller than my fist, is covered in a light blue knitted cap and his tender body appears not quite ready to hatch. Jorge, who has fluid lines and breathing tubes attached to his nose and limbs, rests snugly inside his small warm cocoon.

Originally, two separate units provided the care now supplied by the one Omnibed. The separate units necessitated the transference of the baby from one unit to the other to receive treatment. “When we admit a baby there is a lot to do during the first few days. It is a crucial time as a premature baby needs to be handled as little as possible and needs a stabile environment,” McFadden carefully explains. A consistently warm and humid atmosphere that emulates the womb is essential, along with fluid lines and breathing tubes to support life. One of the dangers encountered during movement is possible bleeding in the brain. Blood vessels in the baby’s head are fragile and the changes in body fluids and oxygen levels can cause bleeding in the brain.

We stroll outside of the NICU to sit on a garden bench in a small artistically decorated children’s garden. McFadden, herself a mother of two, resumes our conversation in warm, confident tones of experience. “If a baby is delivered extremely premature and needs a higher level of care, we have three neonatal intensive care sites the baby can be sent to. Our clinic treats those with the highest level of need. We also treat the most unusual cases from babies with abnormalities to genetic syndromes. I tell my nurses, ‘If you’ve never seen it before, you’ll see it here and you’ll see it twice.’ ”

After 20 years of working in a life-death environment, I ask McFadden how she deals with such emotional intensity. She stops and thinks about my question saying, “I’ve always had a faith that allowed me to accept that if a baby didn’t survive it wasn’t the fault of the team — it was God’s plan.”
As I listen to McFadden, I think of baby Jorge lying in his Omnibed and feel convinced that God has many helpers, including McFadden and Las Patronas.

For more information on Las Patronas or the 2004 Jewel Ball, call 858/527-1686.