We were so lucky to have a wonderfully diverse group to judge our Caregiver Contest this year! We thanked all our judges by making a monetary donation to a charity of their choice — you can read about the judges and the charities they picked below.
Margarita Bermudez, MSW, serves as the Manager of Professional Training and Healthcare Services at Alzheimer’s Los Angeles. She provides professional trainings, outreaches to healthcare professionals, and participates in systems-level changes that increase dementia-capable healthcare systems in an effort to improve care coordination and care transitions for people living with dementia and their families. Mrs. Bermudez earned her Master’s Degree in Social Work from the University of Denver with a Social Work with Latinos/Latinas Certificate. She has over 10 years of work experience working with the non-profit sector. Margarita chose to have us donate to her organization: Alzheimer’s Los Angeles.
Alethea Mshar has been writing for Shield HealthCare’s GROW with Shield community since 2016. She writes from the perspective of a mom with two children with Down syndrome, Alex and Ben. Ben is adopted and, in addition to his Down syndrome, also has hearing impairment, Hirschsprung’s disease, Cyclical Vomiting Syndrome and Functional vomiting. Alethea wrote the following about how she chose the entries she picked to win: “The reason I chose each of these is because of the honor each of the people show in their attitude toward the person they care for.” You can read more from Alethea in our GROW community and on her blog, Ben’s Writing, Running Mom. The charity Alethea chose to support is St. Baldrick’s Foundation.
Joy Hooper is an RN with over 20 years of wound and ostomy care experience. Joy has practiced in a variety of hospital and home care settings. Joy has presented many of Shield HealthCare and the Wound Care Education Institute’s joint ostomy-related webinars. You can learn more about Joy and about the anatomical aprons she creates and sells at https://www.apronsbyjoy.com/. The charity Joy chose to support is Ostomy 211.
Thank you so much to our judges! We’ll be publishing the winning stories next week, so check back soon!
