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Centra to honor health care heroes with parades and fun activities during National Hospital Week

Centra is asking the community to come out and show their appreciation

All week long, caregivers are being honored and thanked at Centra with fun activities, events, parades and meals. This is all for National Hospital Week, which started on May 8 and runs until the 15th.

The parades are a chance to take a moment and recognize those who help our friends, family and community every day. The pandemic put a spotlight on how important our health care workers are. The theme for this year is “Stronger Together: Embrace the Future.”

Centra is asking the community to come out and show their appreciation on May 11 at each parade, which will begin at noon.

The parade in Lynchburg will go to the campuses of Lynchburg General and Virginia Baptist. The parade in Bedford will circle the block of Bedford Memorial Hospital.

This is a chance to come together and celebrate the caregivers in our community. There will be 74 organizations marching in the parade. In Lynchburg, some of those include Liberty University School of Nursing, the Hillcats, the Harley Davidson Group, local law enforcement and several other organizations.

“We had great participation last year. It was our first annual parade, and there was great involvement from the community, and so we decided to go ahead and have our second one as well, and we have far exceeded our expectations from what happened last year,” Scott Thompson, an HR Consultant for Centra, said.

Centra started off Hospital Week with a pancake breakfast at each of their major campuses. Everyone was able to come by and get free food. They also have planned free fitness classes, nutrition cook-along tutorials, art classes and wellness check-ins.

“This is just our opportunity to show how much we appreciate the work that they do each and every day and how much it means to us as a leadership team,” said Total Rewards Manager for Centra, Aubrey Varraux. “They pour into our patients every single day and then of course to our community, that we are here and are a strong beacon of hope for our community and members alike.”