Ohio’s Hospice is celebrating the fifth anniversary of its Caring Critters program, an initiative that has brought comfort and joy to hundreds of children and families facing end-of-life situations. 

The Caring Critters program, founded in 2019 by Keri Shuman, RN at the Ohio’s Hospice Inpatient Care Center at The Ohio State University, provides hand-crocheted stuffed animals to young visitors at the hospice facilities. These cuddly companions offer emotional support and a welcome distraction during challenging times. 

Shuman’s effort started when she saw a post on Facebook from a lady that made “monsters” for her local hospital’s chaplaincy department.   

“I reached out to her, and she was very generous with sharing her methods and information.  After I spoke with her, I approached the bereavement coordinator at Ohio’s Hospice in Wooster to ask what she thought about doing a similar program on a small scale for the upcoming Camp Waves of Emotion and she was 100% on board,” Shuman said. 

She shared the Caring Critters project with her team and especially chaplain, Bob Halfhill, who liked the idea.   

“I presented the plan during a staff meeting and I had a signup sheet made up. I anticipated difficulty recruiting my team members to ‘adopt’ and provide personalities for these critters, so I had an elaborate plan to get them involved,” Shuman said. “Turns out that I had a full set of 20 volunteers before I could even walk from the meeting room back to our shared office.” 

Shuman tries to complete a critter once a week, 40 hours of crochet work on top of 40-plus hours of working, and then get that critter to its adopted family.   

Once completed, each adorable little critter gets a photo session with a professional photographer that donates her time and prints.   

The critters were adopted at Camp Waves of Emotion. In 2020, Shuman transferred to the OSU inpatient care center and continued the program on a smaller and more permanent scale.   

“We keep a bin of critters on the unit, and we can adopt them out as young (and even some older persons) people spend time on our unit,” she said. “It’s such a joy to see kids’ faces light up when you enter the room with an outrageous stuffed animal.”  

This program has been sponsored by Park National Bank through the volunteer office at Ohio’s Hospice in Newark. Their funds have provided the booklets and other essentials to continue the program.  All the yarn, sewing materials and time were donated by Shuman or volunteers. Shuman is grateful for everyone that has supported this program from across the state.