When Fraser Lake's community paramedic, Sharon Unger, was stricken with cancer, her emergency services colleagues from across the 9-1-1 spectrum got together to give her a little boost of the spirits. It was a five-minute video, just a short little vignette, but it is causing a large stir across the province as their goofy gift goes viral.
The little show is a faux music video set to the song The Power Of Love by Huey Lewis & The News. The paramedics, firefighters, RCMP and other healthcare professionals of the Fraser Lake-Nechako Valley area came together to ham it up for the camera.
"It took us about two months," said Kenneth Cao, a primary care paramedic for BC Emergency Health Services (BCEHS) in Fraser Lake. "The difficulty was filming people when they weren't on shift or working at their day-job. Half the crew has other jobs. We ended up just texting each other 'hey, I have a few free minutes, let's film' or 'we're off now, can we do some filming?' And then it took me about a week of editing."
Each scene has one of the participating emergency responders mouthing the synched lyrics while wearing comical costumes, doing little dance routines, and other funny antics all over the small town west of Prince George.
"When we got together it was more of a party than anything," said Cao. "Somebody brought chili one time. All of us couldn't get together at one time so clips were sent in from Kamloops and Oliver. We had (fellow paramedic) Catherine Scott's daughter Jade (in Grade 5) and her friend Darwin Harder teaching how to dance. They taught us well, but we didn't always learn well. We tried our best. It really made people laugh, which was good."
The process of filming was a curiosity for the people of Fraser Lake, who would see and hear about the guerilla film shoots. Cao said the whole town was behind the project in spirit.
Word also got out to the BCEHS organization. When the video passed 35,000 views, it was clearly catching a broader wave of interest then the little greeting card it was intended to be.
"We have a provincial service - almost 4,000 paramedics are a part of BCEHS - and this brought Sharon's story to light for so many people who had never met her," said Fatima Siddiqui, a communications officer with the provincial ambulance service. "It was very well received. She is an amazing person, she actually trained Kenneth and got him to move to Fraser Lake from Vancouver. This was a very special act of love from her friends."
Unger is still off work as she recovers from a successful treatment campaign. Her feedback to the video creators was resounding gratitude.
"The whole emergency department that took part are truly amazing," Unger said. "The video was extremely touching. I cried and I laughed. It made me want to fight twice as hard to get back to the crew and our patients. So I will fight the fight and in the meantime, Fraser Lake is extremely blessed to have this crew looking out for them."
The crew involved from Station 763 included Cathy Harder, Joe Jenkinson, Fanny Kuffer, Isabel Smith, Andrew Schulz, Dakota Stone, Tomas Schulz, Michael Lee and others who weren't credited but nonetheless wanted the best for their friend Sharon.
She wants to use the whole experience as a positive stepping stone in her career, as she zeroes in on a return to work.
"I think I will be a better paramedic having gone through this," she said. "I have a much better understanding what cancer patients go through. And it's not just cancer patients. I feel I will be able to relate to other patients better, therefore my care of them will be more directed to their needs."
Here is the link to the video:
