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Wound Care Kit Donation Program
In 2025, the Pennsylvania Academy of Dermatology's Public Health and Education Fund (PHEF) Committee learned about the Lehigh Valley Health Partners Street Medicine Program. One of the many things they do is provide support to shelters and recovery homes in their area.
The PAD PHEF Committee wanted to help their cause by donating wound care kits for the Valley Health Partners team to provide to their local shelters, recovery homes, and unsheltered persons in their community.
Wound care is not always your top priority when you are unsheltered or in a recovery home. Providing individuals with physician recommended tools to take care of their wounds makes it that much easier to follow through and get the medical attention they deserve.
We plan to continue to donate to organizations like the Valley Health Partners as often as we can!
You know you want to help, but where do you start?
What kind of items are we putting in the wound care kits?
How many items do we want to put in each wound care kits?
Where do we get them from?
Are we paying for everything?
What is our budget?
Are we collecting donations?
Do they speak another language?
How do we instruct them how to use the items?
Who is taking the care packages to them?
Who do we donate to?
Where do we start....?
These (and more) are all questions we had to work through as a group. Don't worry, we're here to help!
KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE
Do your research and find organizations like the Lehigh Valley Health Partners. Reach out to them and ask if they would be interested in partnering with your team. We recommend asking them questions like:
What are the primary languages used in your community?
We included two care instruction cards with our donation of wound care supplies - one in English and one in Spanish. See our card example below!
What resources or facilities are in the area?
Our care instruction cards include addresses and phone numbers of local hospitals, day shelters, and other facilities individuals might need.
Approximately how many people are in need in your community?
The VHP community sees approximately 300 individuals per daily visit. We donated over 300 wound care kits to ensure everyone received one.
BUDGET
How much is your team able to spend on this project? Come up with a budget before gathering supplies for the wound care kits.
COLLECT YOUR SUPPLIES
As a team, decide what materials you think an individual would need in their wound care package. Think about hosting a donation drive for your materials!
Click below to view our supply list for ideas! This document will show every item we included in our wound care kits, how many of each item, and how much each item cost. Make sure you shop around and find the best prices! We found the majority of our items from Amazon. We were also given petroleum jelly and sunscreen by an outside donor!
Click below to view and download the instruction cards we included in the wound care packages. Customize them for your own donation!
GATHER VOLUNTEERS!
At our Annual Scientific Meeting in 2025, we knew we would have lots of eager volunteers that would be more than happy to help us put together all the wound care kits! This is a HUGE undertaking! Don't feel like your team has to do this alone.
We advertised our wound care kit "event" for a few weeks before our Annual Scientific Meeting via email, social media, and word of mouth to our colleagues. Check out an example of our flyer below.
ASSEMBLY
We found the best way to put together these kits was to set it up assembly line style. Starting at the beginning with the bag the items go in, followed by stations of each item. It is helpful to note at each "station" the number of x item that goes in each bag. For example, make a sign that says, "6 bandages" with your stockpile of bandages.
Check out our photo gallery below to see how we set up our assembly line!
This project was a great success and was very well received!
Please reach out to us at info@padermatology.org with any questions. We would love to help your team get started!
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