By LISA SIMPSON STRANGE
GLASGOW — Board members of Community Medical Care and students from Barren County Trojan Academy’s freshmen council got the chance to be Santa’s helpers Tuesday morning at T.J. Samson Community Hospital.
Dr. Bharat Mody, along with CMC representatives Freddie Travis, Tina Combs, Becky Hensley and Jannell Pedigo, assisted ninth-graders Emily Certain and Kati Spillman as they handed out toys to children both visiting and staying in the hospital.
Brenda Chaney, Barren County Youth Services Center coordinator, also accompanied the students and said the volunteers get as much pleasure giving the toys away as the children who receive them do.
“It’s just such a blessing to go and see what a joy it is to bring them these toys,” she said.
After delivering carts full of toys at the hospital, the group also visited Glenview Health Care.
Chaney said Dr. Mody and CMC have been doing this for about four years. She said Mody is “such a wonderful gentleman” because he does so much to help the community.
Barren County schools got involved three years ago when student Cameron Lile found out about the “Jarrett’s Joy Cart” program and initiated it locally.
Jarrett Mynear was a cancer patient from Nicholasville who spent a lot of time in hospitals between the time of his diagnosis at age 2 and his death at 13 in 2002. He came up with the idea of a toy cart for sick children to bring them excitement and joy during their hospital stays.
