Owensboro Health establishes clothing closet available to patients in need

By Christie Netherton, Messenger-inquirer

Owensboro Health has established a clothing closet for health system patients, funded by the OH Foundation, according to foundation director Tracy Naylor.

OH director of emergency and trauma services Alysia Adams said the clothing closet provides necessary clothing items for patients being discharged who are in need of replacement items, such as pants, shirts or shoes.

“We just wanted to make sure we were able to provide appropriate clothing for patients at discharge, as far as making sure it was weather appropriate, that they had appropriate shoes and things like that,” she said. “Oftentimes, you’ll have people who come in and they may not have any shoes, and so we don’t want to send them home and … not be able to provide some type of covering for them.”

Adams said there are a variety of reasons why a patient might be in need of clothing items, such as if the item needed to be removed in an emergency situation, the patient was taken to the hospital without shoes or other clothing items, the clothing is soiled, or clothing is taken as evidence or destroyed.

Adams said the clothing closet was a necessary addition to Owensboro Health Regional Hospital to help provide dignity for patients being discharged.

“The clothing closet is really just something that we identify as a need from the emergency department and throughout the patient care tower and behavioral health services,” she said. “It’s just something that was a gap as far as being able to provide additional dignity to our patients when they’re discharging.”

The clothing closet was established Jan. 13 and has since received a lot of use, according to Adams. She said it is already in the process of restocking.

Naylor said clothing items are new and ordered in bulk. She said while many have reached out regarding making clothing donations, the hospital is not accepting clothing donations at this time.

“I’ve had some people reach out about accepting donations, and that’s not something that we’re doing at this time. I would have to revisit that with the foundation to see if that’s something we will be doing in the future, but as of right now, the foundation is providing grant funding for us to purchase new clothing,” Naylor said.

However, she said those wishing to help support efforts such as the OH clothing closet are able to donate to the foundation by visiting OwensboroHealth.org/Foundation.

Christie Netherton, cnetherton@messenger-inquirer.com, 270-691-7360.