Protected Feet
It was winter, it was dark, and it was chilly. Amy Palmer, a Paramedic with Boone Hospital’s Ambulance service responded to a 911 call for an unhoused gentleman who had a medical issue. Amy quickly saw that this patient had literally walked through his shoes. The soles were detaching from the rest of the shoe. It was too cold to be walking around on asphalt with shoes that had worn through on the balls of his feet. This patient’s shoes were also a size too big for his feet and were skater shoes, making them inappropriate for the winter weather.
Amy wanted to make sure this patient had a pair of shoes when he was discharged. She learned from the Social Worker that night that all the shoes that had been brought into the Emergency Room the week before had been given out. Amy’s next call was to COMO Mobile Aid Collective (COMAC).
COMAC provides direct aid and immediate assistance to unsheltered friends in Columbia. A pair of shoes was not able to get to the patient at the hospital before he was discharged, but he did receive a taxi pass to The Room At The Inn and COMAC was able to make sure he had a pair of shoes, in his correct size, when he got there.
Unfortunately, in Amy’s line of work, she frequently encounters an unhoused person with either no shoes, or shoes that are not appropriate for the weather.
Feeling that no patient should leave Boone Hospital without shoes, Amy quickly got to work. She reached out to her boss, Shawn Gerstner, and soon had a meeting with Administration and Shannon Kuczynski, Chief Nursing Executive, who leads Boone Hospital’s Mission Moments.
Shannon joined Boone Health in 2022 and incorporated Mission Recruitment: Meet the Mission. “I have a deep belief that people in a community want to work for an organization that meets the needs of its community,” says Shannon. “When I came to Boone, I started Mission Recruitment: Meet The Mission based upon that premise.”
After Amy described the need that she saw, “Boone’s Crews for Shoes” was born.
For one week in February, staff donated new adult-sized socks and new or gently used adult-sized shoes that were comfortable and suitable for walking outdoors. All sizes of shoes were welcomed, and donations would be used for patients at Boone Hospital and provided to the unsheltered community through COMAC.
What was thought would be a small drive turned into a huge success. Amy was hoping to collect a few dozen pairs of shoes. Boone Hospital staff donated 173 pairs of shoes and 110 pairs of socks. “From this shoe drive, Boone Health has started a partnership with COMAC to ensure we have a wide variety of shoe sizes at the ready for anyone who comes to our facility in need of shoes,” says Amy. Boone saved a dozen pairs for the ER and the rest went to COMAC.
“I think it’s important for people to remember that the majority of us live in a place of privilege,” says Amy. “When it comes to our accessibility to safe food to eat and a safe shelter to stay in, we have a few hundred people in our community that do not experience the same privilege. It is our place, as privileged people to help them out. Most of us have an excess and there are a lot of people out there with a need, and we should use our excess to fill that need.”
Boone Health’s partnership with COMAC ensures there is a wide variety of shoe sizes available to anyone who comes to Boone in need of shoes. To learn more about COMO Mobile Aid Collective, visit comomobileaid.org.
By Erin Wegner