Read what our patients have to say
Martha's Story
Ora's Story
Eve's Story
Warm and good-natured Martha has lived a quiet and sheltered life in Portland. For the past decade, Martha has spent her days in a senior apartment building where she receives caring emotional support from family and friends. But it has become increasingly difficult for Martha to leave her tiny living space and she has rarely been out in six years, even to see a physician.
In 2002, Martha’s health began to deteriorate rapidly. Finally, in October, a nurse from Aging Services convinced her to let a doctor visit. Lucky for Martha, that doctor was Dr. Benneth Husted. Upon examining Martha, Dr. Husted immediately recognized the warning signs of colon cancer and arranged to have her see a specialist. Under Dr. Husted’s guidance, Martha had surgery in November to remove the cancer. She came through the surgery with flying colors and her prognosis is excellent.
Martha is already enjoying an improved quality of life and her family can be assured that her medical needs are now being met. A cousin says that it is “a miracle” that the cancer seems to have been contained. And Martha says, “Dr. Husted and Housecall Providers are wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.”
Martha is fortunate to have found Housecall Providers but also because she has family and friends to provide loving attention. Many Housecall Providers' patients are without even these advantages.
Ora's energetic countenance belies her age. Born in the Appalachian hills in eastern Kentucky to a family with a history of longevity—her grandmother died at the age of 105—she attended a mission school in an area where employment, when available, was in logging or coal mining. Her father taught school, while her mother owned several grocery stores in mining communities whose primary competition was the local coal company commissary.
"I always wanted to do something useful," she says of her choice to enter the field of social services. One of her first jobs was to find employment for "the guys coming back from the war." During her life, she and her husband, who died 16 years ago, lived in Kentucky, Ohio (where she nearly lost a leg in a toboggan accident), Texas and Florida. She retired to a Portland retirement center to be close to her brother and nieces.
With more than nine decades under her belt and a chronic illness to battle, it’s not easy for Ora to get out to see a doctor—often taking several hours for a 15-minute appointment. That’s why Housecall Providers nurse practitioner Darlene Anderson comes to Ora, often spending an hour or more caring for her.
"It is a lot easier for me to not have to go out to a doctor," remarks Ora, who has been on a rigid regimen of medicines and physical therapy following a life-threatening illness. "Instead, the doctor comes to me."
"A lot of people are becoming elderly and many more will need proper in-home care," she says. "Housecall Providers enables people like me to keep on doing a lot of things for ourselves. It's a remarkable thing to be able to be independent considerably longer."
Eve Sprigg is the first to say that her 82 years of life have brought plenty of tragedies, but they haven't altered her optimism. Life is living and dying, she says of her life's experiences, indicating that all God's plans have value.
"Born with 7-league boots," meaning born to travel, Eve began her life in the middle of a Hood River apple orchard, but grew up on the road with her father (a full-blooded Cherokee) and continued to travel throughout her life. She apparently never tired of seeing the world (Peru, Brazil, the South Seas), which she called one of the joys in her life, along with learning.
Along the way, she visited some remarkable places and, with a sense of adventure, not to mention plenty of talent, she participated in the New York jazz scene and found her voice in Walt Disney's animated films. She sang with both big and small bands in New York and Hawaii, including Red Nichols and his Five Pennies, and became the first white woman to sing with an all-black band when she did a gig with Duke Ellington in the 1950s after he heard her sing his composition "Satin Doll."
An autographed picture on her dresser confirms that she worked directly with Walt Disney doing voice-overs for Disney animated features, including the voices of Jiminy Cricket in "Song of the South," the two ugly stepsisters in "Cinderella" and Minnie Mouse.
Later in life, with a love of the tropics that developed after a visit to Tahiti, Eve did shows and worked for the Salvation Army in Hawaii for 26 years.
Eve counts herself as blessed. "You need to develop courage and right thinking, and we're given a lifetime to learn that," Eve says.
Eve passed away earlier this year … she will be missed by all of us at Housecall Providers.