Hospice Rooms
Interior Health has designated two rooms in Mariposa Gardens in Osoyoos to be used as Hospice beds for the South Okanagan. The DVHS Board has requested Trudy Demorest and Lois Brummet (both long time volunteers and former board members) to take the lead on redecorating the rooms by painting, installing new window coverings, and purchasing new furniture.
To start the project off, Desert Valley Hospice Society presented Sienna Living with two Med-Aire Plus mattresses for the two hospice beds in Mariposa Gardens. These mattresses can alternate high and low pressure to provide the best comfort to those bedridden in their final days and will prevent other issues like bed sores from developing. The purchase of the mattresses along with the re-decorating of the rooms is being made possible through generous donations from the communities of Oliver, Osoyoos, and Okanagan Falls over the years. It has taken a long time for DVHS to secure these beds for hospice patients in the South Okanagan and with the revamping of the rooms it is hoped to make the users of the rooms and their families as comfortable as possible.

Pictured are Ian Kehler, Social Worker, Mariposa Gardens; Janette Van Vianen, Administrator, Desert Valley Hospice Society; Trudy Demorest, Past President and Life member, Desert Valley Hospice Society; Erika Olsen, Executive Director, Mariposa Gardens; and Sandra, Rehabilitation Assistant, Mariposa Gardens.

Plaque presentation left to right: Myers Bennet, Osoyoos Town Councillor; Colleen Anderson, DVHS Board member; Linda Larson, DVHS President; Janette Van Vianen, DVHS Administrator; Becky Miller, Interior Health Director of Clinical Operations, Community Seniors Care South Okanagan; Trudy Demorest, DVHS Life Member; Madeleine Csillig-Wong, Interior Health Executive Director, Clinical Operations; Ian Kehler, Mariposa Gardens Social Worker

