“Sometimes you have to hope something good can come from tragedy,” says Cynthia Thorne.

There’s a warmth – a positive energy – one can feel from Cynthia when she talks. She has experienced tremendous loss and has had a front row seat for the unfairness life can sometimes throw, but she is someone who looks for the ‘silver lining.’

When her son, Myles, passed away in 2014 following a series of unpredictable, uncontrollable, and unfair circumstances, her eyes were opened to the difference a well-equipped hospital can make. He had been enjoying time in a small town in northern Ontario when an accident resulted in head trauma and a visit to the town’s tiny rural hospital. Myles needed to be intubated and transported to a larger regional hospital for more substantial care, but a lack of advanced medical equipment – particularly a glidescope, which aids in intubation – combined with unsafe flight conditions, which delayed a medical transfer by helicopter, resulted in his condition deteriorating. He was eventually transported to the regional hospital, where he passed away in the Intensive Care Unit. Myles was 27 years old.

“If they had a glidescope, the outcome could have been different,” recounts Cynthia. “You can never know for sure, but you realize when something like this happens the role hospital equipment plays.”

Cynthia and her husband, Bruce, reached out to NHH Foundation to make a gift in memory of Myles. They initially inquired about purchasing a glidescope to help prevent another family experiencing the tragic outcome theirs did. Upon learning NHH already had recently acquired this equipment, they instead agreed to support the purchase of a transport ventilator.

“I really hope the transport ventilator can help others – either help save their life or even just make their transfer easier,” explains Cynthia. “If it helps anyone at all, that’s good.”

Supporting healthcare is not new to Cynthia. She has deep family roots in Belleville and her family, along with their family business in that area, have always supported their local hospital. She and Bruce moved to Cobourg about 10 years ago and were originally inspired to make their first gift to NHH Foundation in 2016 by the care they received.

“The care has been excellent any time we have needed it,” says Cynthia. “The team has been amazing, reassuring, and a calming influence during stressful times and exams. To be able to get to a hospital within minutes and know you’ll get excellent care – you can’t put a price on that.”

The couple’s most recent gift, combined with funds raised by a local garden party fundraiser hosted annually by Reg and Joanne Marrison, made the transport ventilator possible. An imperative piece of equipment for some of NHH’s most vulnerable patients when transportation is needed, this gift will touch the lives of many.

Making this gift in memory of Myles is just one more way Cynthia and Bruce continue to look for that silver lining, to help something good come from their tragedy. They focus on the lights in their lives – their daughter, Alexandra, her husband, Mike, and their two granddaughters, Tory and Addison – and they hope their story and their gift can make a difference.