A group of community-minded corporate donors joined forces to provide a big boost to our efforts to support the life-saving work of our neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), at the Rawlco Centre for Mother Baby Care at the Regina General Hospital. The group, led by Young’s Equipment and two of Young’s suppliers – MacDon Industries and Vaderstad Canada – contributed $300,000 to Hospitals of Regina Foundation in December, 2021 to help us invest in one of two new transport isolettes for our NICU.

Essentially, an isolette is a portable NICU, containing an incubator system for a newborn who needs to be transported safely by our specialized medical team to our NICU. Given the urgency of getting medically fragile newborns into specialized care as soon as possible, it is not a stretch to conclude the isolette will be a life-saver, particularly in rural areas of southern Saskatchewan.

“It was an easy decision for us to support this important initiative,” says Sean Young, assistant general manager of the family-operated Young’s Equipment. “The majority of our business is done in rural Saskatchewan, so this is a great way for us to give back to those communities. There’s also a very personal reason why this made a lot of sense for our company, and our family.”

In fact, this cause hits particularly close to home for the Young family. That’s because Sean’s youngest son Cameron spent his first seven weeks in Regina’s NICU, after being born prematurely in December, 2020.

“It really hits home when it’s your own child, and you see the work the NICU team does first-hand,” Sean states. “We’re just so grateful for the excellent and compassionate care Cameron received, and continues to receive, from Regina’s hospitals. That’s why we didn’t hesitate to throw our support behind the Foundation’s fundraising effort for the new isolettes. It’s important to us as a business, but also as a family.”

Each year, an average of 500 newborns receive specialized care at our NICU. The NICU is especially critical in the case of babies who arrive prematurely, since these are the tiniest, most fragile patients seen in Regina’s hospitals, and they require round-the-clock care to have a fighting chance at life.

“We are so grateful for the support of Young’s Equipment, MacDon Industries and Vaderstad Canada,” said Dino Sophocleous, President and CEO Hospitals of Regina Foundation. “Thanks to Sean Young’s leadership and the generosity of all three partners, we invested in this essential technology for our NICU, which will give babies across southern Saskatchewan and the province access to the best possible health care, regardless of where they live.”