More Than a Ride: Faith in Action volunteers rescue seniors during crisis

By MEDHA SARIN: 

Carol Pierroforte always waits outside her apartment complex to be picked up for her routine Faith in Action trip to the store. But when her driver, Trevor Hoyle, arrived one Wednesday in April, he said Ms. Pierroforte was nowhere to be seen. 

“When I laid there on the floor, I thought, ‘Trevor, you know I'm always out in front there. Please come up to my apartment door, knock, whatever you have to do to help me,’” Ms. Pierroforte remembered. 

The Liberty Hill senior said she was showering in her apartment on Tuesday at 8:30 a.m., the day before her scheduled trip. She stepped out of the shower, slipped, fell, and broke her arm. She said she lay in the bathroom in immense pain for almost 30 hours.

“It was a bad fall,” Ms. Pierroforte said. “I yelled and screamed for most of the day Tuesday trying to get some help, and nobody heard me at all, so I lay there all day, all night. 

Faith in Action is a nonprofit that offers transportation and other services to Georgetown area seniors to help them live independently. Mr. Hoyle is the organization’s designated van driver, and takes a group of seniors on errands to different stores multiple times a week.

“[Mr. Hoyle] knew something was wrong when I wasn't out in front ready to be picked up, and he came up, knocked on my door,” Ms. Pierroforte said.

Ms. Pierroforte said that although she passed out, Trevor’s knocking woke her up enough to call for help. He had one of the apartment’s maintenance people open the door, where he found Ms. Pierroforte on the ground and called 911. She is now recovering after being hospitalized. 

“I broke my arm very bad, so I spent a long period here getting back on my feet,” Ms. Pierroforte said. 

Faith In Action provided more than 10,000 rides to seniors last year. Program director Tracy Barber said most rides and pickups are routine and predictable. That moment of crisis for Ms. Pierroforte in April turned a typical errand run into a miraculous rescue. 

“If it hadn't been for Faith in Action, I don't know how long I would have laid there,” she said. 

Ms. Pierroforte isn’t the only rescue story the senior service organization has had recently. A week earlier, the nonprofit’s two pathways drivers — who take clients to medical checkups and personal appointments —  noticed something different about a client while taking her to and from a medical check up. 

“I had picked her up several times in the past. She was just bubbly and happy and smiley and talkative, and we just had the best time talking in the car,” said Donna Hoffman, who had been on the morning shift taking the client to the appointment. “But this particular day, I picked her up, and she absolutely wasn't her usual self. I could tell that something was wrong.”

Ms. Hoffman said she called Suzanne Murphy, the other pathways driver scheduled to pick the client up after the appointment, to share her concerns about the senior.

“I knew if I reached out to her that she would have total compassion for [the client], and she absolutely did,” Mrs. Hoffman said. 

The phone call paid off. Ms. Murphy also identified unusual, lethargic behavior from the client when they met later in the day. She called and followed up with the staff at the client’s medical appointment, and also reached out to the client’s emergency contacts. She was hospitalized for sepsis, a life-threatening medical condition caused when a person’s immune system overreacts to an infection.

“We are absolutely not medically trained or certified in any way, so we walk a fine line of liability and responsibility there, but in this case, our fears were well-founded and justified, because the next day she went to the hospital,” Ms. Hoffman said. “The medical professional said that her life was perhaps saved because of our intervention.”

Her support also continued beyond the gas pedal. After work one day, she checked in to see the client at the hospital. 

“She has the best smile – I got to see that smile,” Mrs. Hoffman said. “She was just feeling so much better, and kind of back to her normal self.”

As for Ms. Pierroforte, the nonprofit’s van driver contacted her family after the incident. 

“I was very fortunate Trevor, my driver, called my family and everything,” Ms. Pierroforte said. “All of them were notified, and he had told them what happened. They, of course, went to the hospital, so I was well taken care of.” 

A drivers’ ability to sense something wrong with a  clients and immediately provide help speaks to strong communication skills and compassion for a community of people that sometimes goes ignored, Ms. Barber said.

“I love that their heart is in it,” she said. “When something doesn't feel right, they share that concern, and they take the time to talk to our clients. Many people don't give our seniors the time that they need, or they push them off, like, ‘Oh, that’s not a big deal, you'll be fine.’ ”

Drivers find joy in hearing stories from clients on car rides. Ms. Hoffman said it’s her favorite part of the job, and that people can learn a lot from the elderly.

“You will hear about every minute detail of their life, and it is so heartwarming just to listen to them and just care about them,” Ms. Hoffman said. “They have lived amazing, amazing lives. I took the job to try to minister to them, and in turn, they're ministering to me.”

From behind the wheel, Faith in Action gives Ms. Pierroforte the support she needs to live a full life. 

“I like having my independence, my apartment, and everything here,” Ms. Pierroforte said. “But I know that if I'm needing some help, they're there for me.”