Patients spending the holiday at Monongahela Valley Hospital’s Orthopedic Institute will receive a special gift wishing them quick recoveries, thanks to the generosity of three local stores and one assistant manager, who feels like MVH is “her family.”
Brittany Fagioletti, 23, of Belle Vernon, convinced her colleagues at Aéropostale stores — Washington Tanger Outlets, Pittsburgh’s Robinson Town Center and Greensburg’s Westmoreland Mall — to each give 48 plush Christmas Gund teddy bears to MVH’s Orthopedic Institute joint replacement patients this holiday. Miss Fagioletti’s mother Kim is the nurse manager for the Orthopedic Institute and her sister Erika works in the Gift Shop.
“I know how hard my mom works here and how much she cares for her patients,” said Miss Fagioletti, who also once worked in the hospital’s Gift Shop. “I wanted to do something special for the patients; it feels like family here.”
Senior Vice President of Nursing Mary Lou Murt said the hospital will also use a few of the bears to comfort any children who might come to the Emergency Department during Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.
This is the first time the Aéropostale stores donated the bears to the hospital’s patients. Many of the hospital’s departments have special holiday treats and traditions to lighten a holiday hospital stay.
