Yad Sarah Adds New Branches

Yad Sarah is opening a new branch in Acre, a port city in northwest Israel, to serve the areas between Nahariya and Krayot, a cluster of four small cities on the outskirts of Haifa. Acre recently experienced a period of rapid development, and its diverse population—comprising newcomers and old-timers, Jews, Muslims, and Christians—has swelled.

The Acre branch will offer two main services: workshops for people with disabilities, and a lending service for medical devices and equipment. Rinat Rider, Yad Sarah's home and community services manager in north Israel, says Yad Sarah's presence in an area contributes to that area's growth and development.

The new branch will make Yad Sarah's services more accessible, sparing them the long drive to Nahariya. "People are very much anticipating this opening. Demand is high for equipment for fall injuries, and the road to Nahariya is heavy with traffic, which makes it difficult for caregivers to get the help they need," says Rider. The elderly are not the only ones who will be grateful for the new branch. "Imagine a new mother who has to drive for hours in traffic to get a breast pump and a cradle."

The Poriya Hospital Branch

Imagine you've just been released from the hospital. You're itching to get back to your own house and cut off that despised hospital band—until you realize you can't leave. You need critical equipment to manage at home, and the hospital doesn't provide it. What a letdown.

Yad Sarah's hospital branches serve as the missing link, lending newly-released patients equipment such as wheelchairs and other home-hospital equipment like bed hoists. Yad Sarah is opening a new branch in the Baruch Padeh Medical Center, located on the Poriya ridge above Tiberius. It currently has branches in the northern hospitals of Rambam Medical Center in Haifa, Ziv Medical Center in Safed, Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya, Hillel Yaffe Medical Center in Hadera, and HaEmek Medical Center in Afula.

Rinat Rider, Yad Sarah's home and community services manager in north Israel, says she gets a tremendous amount of appreciation from beneficiaries of Yad Sarah's hospital programs. "Not long ago a son with his elderly mother, released from Ziv hospital after a falling injury, told me our hospital branch saved them a lot of time and grief worrying about mobility and even just getting back to their home. He said it's a must to have these branches in every hospital."