March 20, 2005

As St. Mary’s Medical Center began planning its 75th anniversary, key personnel gave employees and members of the community a chance to determine how the hospital ought to celebrate.

“One common strong theme was that we’ve always given to the community, and we need to give to the community in honor of our 75th,” said Becky Dodson, vice president of Mission.

“So let’s do a legacy project that will help us to remember our anniversary by giving back to the community.”

The result was the Legacy Project, a health-education program for the area’s Hispanic citizens. The idea is to offer people from the Hispanic community an opportunity to participate in specialized certified-nursing assistant (CNA) training.

The program will benefit recipients as well as St. Mary’s, she said.

“These are skills that will always be needed in our community, and frankly, this will help St. Mary’s too because we know we’re going to have a health-care provider shortage in the future. This program will help us get well-trained, dedicated staff.”

CNA jobs are entry-level clinical positions at the hospital, but those who participate in the training will eventually be able to pursue a licensed practical nurse (LPN) degree and ultimately credentials as a registered nurse (RN), if they wish.

“We’ve partnered with Pellissippi State Technical Community College, and the first stop for people will be an assistant to test their English language skills and English comprehension skills. If those need work, Pellissippi has programs to bring people up to speed,” said Mrs. Dodson.

“The other component is that in addition to our regular CNA trainer, we will have a translator, not to help with conversational English, but to assist us when we start getting into technical medical terms to make sure everyone understands clearly.”

The first class will begin in June, and St. Mary’s hopes for 12 to 20 participants. Mrs. Dodson said the hospital is working closely with the diocesan Hispanic Ministry Office to help find candidates.