Holiday cheer is everywhere at the John Theurer Cancer Center. We are so grateful to several local businesses that have recently donated lovely and tasty goodies for our patients and their families to enjoy here and at home.

Our Surprise and Delight Committee, which secures and coordinates product donations to the Cancer Center, thanks the following generous businesses for brightening up the lives of our patients and their family members. We wish to spotlight these recent donations:

• Carvel of Hackensack, for its monthly donation of 100 ice cream sundaes
• Edible Arrangements of Hackensack, for a scrumptious fresh fruit creation
• Naturally Beautiful Plant Products of Belvidere and Inserra Shop-Rites, for 100 gorgeous pink poinsettias
• Inserra Shop-Rites, for gift cards that we are using to purchase cheese and sandwich platters and other items for our Christmas party for patients and families.

“In founding the Surprise and Delight Committee in 2007, we looked to the Starbucks Coffee Company for inspiration,” explains Andrew L. Pecora, M.D., chairman and executive administrative director of the John Theurer Cancer Center. “Starbucks took a simple cup of coffee and turned it into an experience around which people gather and communicate. At John Theurer, we are learning from companies such as Starbucks how to transform the customer’s experience – in our case a patient’s time spent here with us – into a positive one. We are bringing corporate models of hospitality, service, and meeting the customers’ needs into our Cancer Center in order to provide quality experiences for our patients and to expand our extraordinary cancer care.”

The Surprise and Delight Committee is made up of John Theurer Cancer Center employees, who are assisted by medical center volunteers. Product donations are distributed to patients throughout the Cancer Center’s facilities in the Medical Plaza, Sanzari Building, and Hillcrest Building. If you’d like to make a product donation to Surprise and Delight patients and their loved ones, please call the committee’s co-chairs: Jeannie Jones at 201-996-5914 or Kathy Roupenian at 201-336-8704.