Volunteers at Anchorage Catholic hospital touch tiniest lives

Published: 2007-12-27

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (CNS) -- It just might be the sweetest, cuddliest volunteer opportunity in the whole state of Alaska. For 67 volunteers at Providence Hospital in Anchorage, that opportunity is called the Kuddle Korps. Little training is required. You just have to love very small babies, and have the patience to sit for a couple of hours in a rocking chair holding them quietly. At the hospital's neonatal intensive care unit, Dale Bader is the lead volunteer for the Kuddle Korps, and she also "rocks" during a two-hour weekly shift with the tiny infants. Bader has rocked for five years and it shows. Her motherly -- and grandmotherly -- instincts are undeniable as she tenderly but very efficiently tucks a premature infant into her arms. "When I quit work, I knew I needed something to do. And I knew I wanted to hold babies," said the grandmother of seven. "I called every hospital in town." The right call went to Providence Hospital where the neonatal intensive care unit is the largest in the state. Every other hospital in Alaska refers newborn babies who are premature or born with complications to Providence.

Copyright (c) 2007 Catholic News Service /U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. The CNS news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed, including but not limited to such means as framing or any other digital copying or distribution method, in whole or in part without the prior written authority of Catholic News Service .