This nutrition intervention resulted in a variety of health and wellness benefits such as better blood glucose control. Results in 1996 were impressive. The minority elderly participated in the nutrition program in greater numbers. Each of the individual senior center participation goals were achieved and methods to reach minority elderly were determined to be effective and will be continued. Over a period of two years, corporate volunteers from 11 local corporations such as Schering Plough, Ortho, and Hoechst-Celanese as well as students from the Midland School and a local ARC group provided the volunteer power to expand meal delivery to the homebound in Somerset County.
Corporate volunteers use their lunch hour to devote to meal delivery.
The volunteer participation provided for delivery of 18 percent of the total daily home delivered meals and provided a cost-effective solution to reducing the waiting lists. The recruitment of over 200 Corporate Volunteers and the participation of two groups of students at three of the centers where meals are distributed accomplished an additional capacity for the program to serve more homebound elderly and to save program dollars. This initiative created a new and highly successful collaboration for a county administered program that had traditionally relied on government funding to expand service to the homebound.