A week or so ago I got a call from Bryan Cheplic, the new media contact person for Wahiawa General Hospital. He had a guy who wanted to tell me the story of how the hospital staff had professionally and personally cared for the guy’s father in his father’s final days at the hospice section of the hospital. Was I interested?

Sounded like an interesting story, so I wound my way up the hill to Wahiawa to meet with Bryan and his friend. The “guy with the story to tell” turned out to be Bobby Bunda, the long-time State Representative and Senator for Central Oahu. I had never met Mr. Bunda, but knew his name, of course. I quickly found out that he was not only a life-long Wahiawa resident but that he also had strong North Shore roots: he and his father were both born at the old Waialua Sugar Plantation hospital. Bobby and his five siblings grew up in a warm, loving Filipino family environment, so when his father finally became ill in his late 80’s the family came together to make sure he was well cared for with in-home hospice at the family home in Wahiawa. Bunda’s mother had passed on some ten years before. The sons and daughters, mostly Bobby’s sister Toni and her son Nicholas, bore most of the load caring for Dad. Finally, though, the family could no longer care for him at home. The siblings held a family meeting: where was the best place to bring Dad? Some of the family had reservations about “little old” Wahiawa General. Weren’t the bigger, more modern hospice facilities in Honolulu better? Finally, though, the proximity of Wahiawa Hospital to the family won out. Santiago Bunda – Dad – entered the hospice section at Wahiawa. It didn’t take long for the family to realize that they had made the right choice. As Bobby Bunda said in a letter to Becky Canon-Fratis, Administrator at the hospital: “… the personal attention he received from all the nursing staff was simply … the best. … our decision to admit dad to WGH was the right one. From day one, our burdens were lifted from our shoulders because of the great service he and our family received.” Nurse Becky Cannon-Fratis was, in fact, the first face the Bundas saw when Santiago was admitted. Nurse Becky is in charge of the “non-medical,” side of the hospital, meaning areas other than things like operating rooms and the brand-new Emergency Room. She is second generation at Wahiawa; her mother was a “candy-striper” at the hospital for 45 years. Becky oversees 107 beds filled from the “medical” side of the hospital as well as from other hospitals and the community, and the ten or so hospice beds.

Santiago Bunda drew his last breath at Wahiawa General Hospital on New Year’s Eve, 2015. A week before, the whole family had gathered in his room for a happy, loving Christmas celebration. Bunda’s letter to the hospital concluded, “While some of my family had mixed feelings about WGH in the beginning, we all, at the end, had nothing but praises for the hospital. It was truly a blessing.”

Wahiawa General Hospital serves us on the North Shore as well as all of Central Oahu. Lucky we got ‘em.