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To the Editor:
This letter is an appeal to the public-at-large concerning a serious ommision with our Arkadelphia hospital. Allow me to share one example. Several years ago, a college student lost control of her car and was killed on Highway 7/67 just past the Clark County Sale Barn. Her roadside cross remains there today. Knowing her condition was serious, friends came to the hospital. I encountered this sorrowful group on the basement loading outside the kitchen area. I asked them what was wrong. They replied [they were] told there was a chapel somewhere down there they could not find. I guided the group to “the chapel” (there are no directional signs) in a remote hallway’s last door before an exit to the physician parking lot.
According to authorities, the original blueprints of the hospital denoted a tiny (about the size of a bathroom) chapel next to the ER, but the present isolated location was accepted 25 years ago. If you go to the other Baptist Health hospitals (or the majority of American hospitals) you will see prominent, accessable chapels. I have been to all levels of administration to the very top in my 18 years of being here, and the best answer I have received is that funds are not available for relocation.
This community and hospital deserve better. The chapel is the soul of the hospital. People go there for birth, death, serious illness, and miraculous recoveries — a sacred place for tears and joys needs to be provided. Please contact me with any thoughts you may have: Dr. Kevin C. McLeod, 2910 Cypress Drive, Arkadelphia, AR 71923.
Dr. Kevin C. McLeod
Arkadelphia
To the Editor:
This letter is an appeal to the public-at-large concerning a serious ommision with our Arkadelphia hospital. Allow me to share one example. Several years ago, a college student lost control of her car and was killed on Highway 7/67 just past the Clark County Sale Barn. Her roadside cross remains there today. Knowing her condition was serious, friends came to the hospital. I encountered this sorrowful group on the basement loading outside the kitchen area. I asked them what was wrong. They replied [they were] told there was a chapel somewhere down there they could not find. I guided the group to “the chapel” (there are no directional signs) in a remote hallway’s last door before an exit to the physician parking lot.
According to authorities, the original blueprints of the hospital denoted a tiny (about the size of a bathroom) chapel next to the ER, but the present isolated location was accepted 25 years ago. If you go to the other Baptist Health hospitals (or the majority of American hospitals) you will see prominent, accessable chapels. I have been to all levels of administration to the very top in my 18 years of being here, and the best answer I have received is that funds are not available for relocation.
This community and hospital deserve better. The chapel is the soul of the hospital. People go there for birth, death, serious illness, and miraculous recoveries — a sacred place for tears and joys needs to be provided. Please contact me with any thoughts you may have: Dr. Kevin C. McLeod, 2910 Cypress Drive, Arkadelphia, AR 71923.
Dr. Kevin C. McLeod
Arkadelphia
