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Las Floristas
The Las Floristas Children’s Charities, a nonprofit, all-volunteer organization,
was started more than 75 years ago by a group of civic-minded women who wished to
help children and adolescents with physical disabilities lead more productive lives.
Las Floristas has exclusively supported Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation
Center Pediatrics activities for four decades. With gifts totaling more than $10 million
to date, Las Floristas has funded many Rancho programs, always concentrating on the
special needs of children.
The devotion to our special children has helped provide care and assistance to
thousands with birth defects, brain damage, severe injuries resulting from accidents,
and other acquired disabilities. Our goal is to help children return to school with
the confidence to take on new challenges and the tools to discover and use every bit
of the ability within them. Every day, Las Floristas proves that one
person can make a difference in the life of a child.
Some of the many programs Las Floristas has funded include:
- The Kenneth and Harlyne Norris
Center for Applied Rehabilitation Technology (CART)
- The Marilyn J. Hilton Resource Center & Gregory R. Dillon Garden Plaza
- Rancho’s Las Floristas Pediatric Wheelchair Sports Program
- Las Floristas Medical Transport Van
- Nancy Dillon Pathokinesiology Computer Center
- Las Floristas Neurospsychology Laboratory
- Las Floristas College Scholarship/Awards Program
- Children’s Carnival Day
- Birthday Celebrations for Children with Disabilities
Here are a few highlights from three Las Floristas-sponsored projects at Rancho:
- The Computer Therapy Lab at CART offers computers for special
needs children with special keyboards, and other accessibility
options so that children can again use the computer to
learn and play. Las Floristas provided special pediatric software
and peripheral equipment designed especially for special needs children.
-
The Wheelchair Sports Program provides 40 of Rancho’s inpatients
and outpatients with the opportunity to participate in success-oriented
physical activities. The program was started more than 25 years
ago and has been funded by Las Floristas since its inception.
The Rancho Wheelchair Sports Program is the only comprehensive wheelchair
sports program in California that caters to youth and is completely
free of charge for participants. Many of our wheelchair sports program
athletes not only graduate from high school, but attend college and participate
in sports. Our athletes are becoming educated, goal-oriented and
productive members of society.
- The Las Floristas Scholarship/Awards Program has already
helped more than 70 young people with their goals of obtaining a
college degree. Several of those students have begun working on their
Masters degrees. The Scholarship program is the crowning jewel
of the rehabilitation process for Rancho’s children. It is hopes
and dreams that build the future, and education is its path.
At Rancho, with the assistance of Las Floristas, every child and
family is made aware that opportunities exist for each child to
succeed at all educational levels and that with hard work and loving
support, these special children can realize the power of their dreams.
Neither disability nor financial issues are allowed to deter the
success of our children.
Providing Comprehensive Care
The Department of Pediatrics at Rancho Los Amigos continues to
provide comprehensive evaluation and ongoing medical supervision for children
with physical disabilities from infancy to 21 years of age. Some of
the disorders treated at Rancho include spinal cord injury,
traumatic head injury, children on ventilators or with tracheostomy tubes,
meningitis and encephalitis, Guillain-Barre Syndrome, muscular dystrophy
and spinal muscular atrophy.
The Las Floristas Commitment
Each member of Las Floristas devotes her personal volunteer
time and energy both to fund-raising and to personal contact with the children
we sponsor. We are active participants at our clinics, and especially enjoy
the “hands-on” work we do at the festive holiday parties and special
projects created for our patients.
Luis Montes, M.D., Chief of Rancho’s Department of Pediatrics, stated, “The
support of Las Floristas continues to uplift us. Your dedication to the
children of Rancho continues to give us hope, and continues to allow us to dream.”
Donating to Las Floristas
If you wish to make a donation to Las Floristas to help the children of Rancho,
please make your check payable to Las Floristas, Inc. and mail it to:
Las Floristas, Inc.
c/o Rancho Los Amigos Foundation
Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center
7601 E. Imperial Highway, SSA-1110
Downey, CA 90242
Page last updated March 5, 2013
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