Editor,
In June, I received a letter from Sutter Health stating that they were permanently closing the Mickelson therapy pool at Mills Hospital. I had just pre-paid my $200 annual membership fee in 2020 when I learned that the pool had been closed “temporarily” due to the pandemic (I, and many other patrons, have yet to receive a refund for our money).
For more than eight years, since a failed hip operation and severe spinal issues, that therapy pool was a lifeline for me, as well as for so many others. No other type of physical therapy, exercise, or movement gave me anything close to the relief that the warm and buoyant water provided.
In the year since then, as I waited anxiously for word that the pool would reopen, my health and mobility have declined precipitously, and I now cannot walk without assistance and am facing another surgery.
Sutter’s claim that there are “alternative options” for aquatic therapy is false; no other pool with its unique handicapped access and therapeutic features exists in the Bay Area. Sutter ironically cites “being good stewards of [their] resources” as a reason for the permanent closure.
Countless disabled people are being negatively affected by Sutter's profit-before-people approach. But for those in pain, the added cost of medications and surgeries, not to mention the helplessness and depression caused by the lack of the healing therapy this pool provided, cannot be quantified.
I urge Sutter to reverse its decision and reopen this lifesaving facility.
Please sign: https://www.change.org/save-the-Mickelson-pool.
Astrid Varteressian
San Mateo
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(1) comment
You are correct that there is nothing like the Mickelson pool, despite what some at Mills-Penisula
are saying - that is simply dismissive misinformation.
This pool is desperately needed by many in our community. Please “see us.”
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