Sister Denise Wilke, center, is a founding member of, and long-time volunteer for, Mercy Care for the Adirondacks. She now receives volunteer services herself, completing the “Circle of Mercy.” From left are Donna Beal, Wilke and Katherine Rhodes.
(Enterprise photo — Oliver Reil)
LAKE PLACID — Volunteers with Mercy Care for the Adirondacks work to support elders in the community. In time, some volunteers wind up receiving help themselves. Now, a founding member of the organization is doing just that. This is being called the “Circle of Mercy.”
“I don’t know that all the volunteers realize how important they are to the people they’re visiting,” Sister Denise Wilke said.
A social worker by profession, Wilke, 89, has been an active volunteer for MCA since its creation. Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, she was still visiting care receivers in their homes.
“I’ve enjoyed it right from the beginning,” she said.
Today, illness has restricted her mobility; she now requires a walker to get around. However, she still calls her three people twice a week, which she said is incredibly important to them.
“If I happen to miss a call, the next day I hear about it,” she joked. “Even that means a lot, just a telephone call.”
Despite mobility issues, Wilke still makes the rounds in the Elderwood of Uihlein at Lake Placid nursing home, from which the MCA leases their convent space. Every morning, she stops in to see five to seven people.
Wilke, who grew up in Manhattan, entered the Sisters of Mercy convent one month before turning 17 in 1951. She first moved to the Adirondacks in 1968. In 1974, she was reassigned to a Sister of Mercy hospital in Port Jervis, where she stayed for 22 and a half years. She went into leadership in her religious community and, when finished, took a sabbatical. She then received a call to come back upstate, to which she agreed. She’s been here for 21 years now, doing pastoral care for the last 20. She retired in December, but continues her volunteer work.
MCA does not provide medical care, but rather provides social services within their capacity. As a volunteer-based organization, they cannot offer the same care as a home health aide, according to Katherine Rhodes, elder care manager for MCA. However, when she receives requests for services outside their capacity, Rhodes said MCA will always connect the person with the right people. They will also offer their services, such as home visits and help with errands and other chores.
Executive Director at MCA Donna Beal said one of their biggest priorities is for volunteers to build friendships and relationships with their elders to combat isolation and loneliness, not just to help with errands and transportation to appointments.
“It really is the relationship they develop together and (that they) become friends,” Beal said.
MCA was established in Lake Placid in 2007 by the Sisters of Mercy Institute of the Americas, who have a long history of caregiving in the Adirondacks. In 1895, two members of the Sisters of Mercy opened a sanitorium in Gabriels to treat tuberculosis patients. The sisters later established Mercy Hospital in Tupper Lake in response to the need of local woodsmen, who otherwise needed to travel to Utica by train for treatment. The sisters also sponsored the Uihlein Mercy Center in Lake Placid and the Mercy Healthcare Center in Tupper Lake.
Ownership of the nursing homes was transferred to Adirondack Medical Center in 2007, but the few sisters in the area wanted to continue some kind of ministerial work here, Wilke said. They identified the need for elder care as the most pressing.
Under Gov. Kathy Hochul, New York is currently working toward a Master Plan for Aging, which aims to “ensure that older adults and individuals of all ages can live healthy, fulfilling lives while aging with dignity and independence.”
The population of people over 60 in New York is growing fast, with the state already ranked fourth-highest in the nation. According to the New York State Office for the Aging, there are currently 4.6 million individuals 60 years or older in New York state. That number is expected to rise to 5.3 million by 2030, when people 60 and older will make up 25% of the population of 51 counties.
The sisters started MCA slowly with just a few volunteers — most of whom were recent retirees, many nearly the same age as the elders they were helping — and have since seen the organization grow to over 100 volunteers assisting over 100 elders.
“We’ve doubled our staff and grown because the need has grown,” Beal said.
MCA is a not-for-profit certified 501(c)(3) charitable organization. There are no financial, medical or religious requirements to receive help. All services are free of charge, which Beal said is thanks to donations and funding from private organizations and individuals. They receive no state funding.
“It’s the community itself that has made Mercy Care possible with its volunteer service and its generous financial support,” she said. “What we love about this is that it really is neighbor helping neighbor, and Mercy Care helps to coordinate those neighbors to help their neighbors.”
