Tenet Healthcare is proud to announce that, through its Healthy Over Hungry Cereal Drive, more than 100 participating facilities and hospitals collected approximately 2.6 million servings of cereal and raised more than $75,000 to help purchase perishable food items in an effort to provide a healthy, balanced breakfast for children struggling with hunger during the summer.
These generous donations will benefit Feeding America, the largest domestic hunger-relief charity, and 70 of its local food banks and distribution partners across the country.
The drive was held May 29 through June 5. In addition to 98 Tenet hospitals, corporate offices and affiliates, Tenet extends special thanks to 10 children’s hospitals not affiliated with Tenet that participated in the drive: Akron Children’s Hospital (Akron, OH), Children’s Hospital Colorado (Aurora, CO), Children’s Hospital of The King’s Daughters (Norfolk, VA), Children’s National Health System (Washington, DC), Cleveland Clinic (Cleveland, OH), Florida Hospital for Children (Orlando, FL), Kaleida Health (Buffalo, NY), LeBonheur Children’s Hospital (Memphis, TN), Methodist Children’s Hospital & Women’s Services (San Antonio, TX), and Phoenix Children’s Hospital (Phoenix, AZ).
“We are extremely grateful to everyone who contributed to the Healthy Over Hungry Cereal Drive and overwhelmed by the remarkable success of this national effort,” said Trevor Fetter, chairman and CEO of Tenet Healthcare. “At Tenet, we take great pride in being a good corporate citizen, and we are so pleased that our colleagues, patients, physicians and neighbors joined together to fight the tremendous issue of hunger in our communities.”
“Our friends at Tenet Healthcare understand the effect that hunger has on the health of our children and our communities,” said Jan Pruitt, chair of the Feeding America Board of Directors. “Thanks to their Healthy Over Hungry Cereal Drive, the Feeding America network will be able to deliver breakfast to thousands of people we serve. We are so thankful to Tenet and the other participating hospitals for their commitment to help provide the most important meal of the day to children across the country.”
The Cereal Drive was founded in 2010 by the nurses of the Detroit Medical Center Children’s Hospital of Michigan as an attempt to help feed hungry children when they could no longer rely on their schools for nutritious meals. Since then, other pediatric hospitals were challenged to join in the fight against hunger and in 2015 Tenet adopted the Healthy Over Hungry Cereal Drive encouraging all of its facilities and colleagues to join in this effort.
“We are very proud of all of our colleagues at Tenet and especially proud of the nurses at Children’s Hospital of Michigan who founded the Cereal Drive,” said Anna J. Kiger, chief nurse officer at Tenet Healthcare. “Their unending dedication and passion to help children inspired us to launch the Healthy Over Hungry Cereal Drive as a company-wide initiative this year at Tenet because we recognize that good nutrition is essential to good health.”
Whole-grain cereal, when part of a healthy, balanced breakfast that includes dairy, fruits and vegetables, and lean protein, is a popular food item that experts say can help address the hunger gap during the summer months when children are not in school. During the school year, more than 22 million children receive free or reduced-priced meals. When school is out during the summer months, however, only 2.7 million receive free or reduced-price meals. The tremendous results of Tenet’s Healthy Over Hungry Cereal Drive will help address this considerable disparity.
For a complete list of the 2015 Healthy Over Hungry Cereal Drive participating locations and beneficiaries, please visit www.TenetHealth.com/Community-Main/fighthunger.
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About Tenet Healthcare
Tenet Healthcare Corporation is a diversified healthcare services company with more than 125,000 employees united around a common mission: to help people live happier, healthier lives. Through its subsidiaries, partnerships and joint ventures, including United Surgical Partners International (USPI), the company operates 80 general acute care hospitals, 18 short-stay surgical hospitals and over 400 outpatient centers in the United States, as well as nine facilities in the United Kingdom. Tenet’s Conifer Health Solutions subsidiary provides technology-enabled performance improvement and health management solutions to hospitals, health systems, integrated delivery networks (IDN), physician groups, self-insured organizations and health plans. Tenet also operates six health plans. For more information, please visit www.tenethealth.com.
The terms "THC," "Tenet Healthcare Corporation," "the company," "we," "us" or "our" refer to Tenet Healthcare Corporation or one or more of its subsidiaries or affiliates as applicable.
About Feeding America
Feeding America is the nationwide network of 200 food banks that leads the fight against hunger in the United States. Together, we provide food to more than 46 million people through 60,000 food pantries and meal programs in communities across America. Feeding America also supports programs that improve food security among the people we serve; educates the public about the problem of hunger; and advocates for legislation that protects people from going hungry. Individuals, charities, businesses and government all have a role in ending hunger. Donate. Volunteer. Advocate. Educate. Together we can solve hunger. Visit www.feedingamerica.org, Facebook or Twitter.