Kootenai Health to host Teddy Bear Clinic for kids
CAROLYN BOSTICK | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 5 months, 2 weeks AGO
Sadie and Savannah Paulson take their favorite stuffed animals through a past Teddy Bear Clinic through Kootenai Health. The event is geared towards making medical care less scary for kids.
Courtesy photo
A child and medical professional work together to help a stuffed animal "breathe" during the Teddy Bear Clinic through Kootenai Health.
A boy learns about x-rays at a past Kootenai Health Teddy Bear Clinic event to make medical care less scary for kids.
Kids crowd around a stuffed animal hooked up to hooked up to medical equipment during Kootenai Health's Teddy Bear Clinic.
Carolyn Bostick has worked for the Coeur d’Alene Press since June 2023. She covers Shoshone County and Coeur d'Alene. Carolyn previously worked in Utica, New York at the Observer-Dispatch for almost seven years before briefly working at The Inquirer and Mirror in Nantucket, Massachusetts. Since she moved to the Pacific Northwest from upstate New York in 2021, she's performed with the Spokane Shakespeare Society for three summers. | October 9, 2025 1:00 AM
COEUR d’ALENE — Patients of a fluffy persuasion will receive ultrasounds, casting and learn how to better prevent the spread of germs.
The stuffed animal is the patient at the Kootenai Health Teddy Bear Clinic and kids will walk through the event with their favorite stuffed animal and their families.
The clinic is scheduled from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday at Kootenai Health Resource Center, 2003 Kootenai Health Way.
The event will help temper medical fears for kids as they learn about health care processes, so they aren’t stressed in the future when they experience the medical system.
Natalie Anaya of Kootenai Health said kids will also help their stuffed animal patients be admitted and registered just like people are at a real hospital.
“It’s about making the kids familiar with what might happen at a doctor's office. It’s fun to watch the kids and the parents and the interactions they have,” Anaya said. “There are kids who might be scared at the beginning and then by the end they open up.”
Kids will also be familiarized with hospital equipment and get to try on gloves, masks and learn how medical professionals take vital signs.
Children of all ages are invited to take part in the event to get acclimated to what medical care looks like.
“I want as many people to come through as they can,” Anaya said. “We saw some sharks last year; we even saw a giraffe. Any stuffed animal will work, it doesn’t have to be a bear.”
ITD’s mascot, Stanley the Sasquatch, will be there to do the clinic and engage with the kids.
Kootenai Health has also invited firefighters and police as “hometown heroes” to welcome kids.
Ensuring that health care is less scary to kids has kept the event as an anchor for Kootenai Health staff to bring back over the course of the last 10 years.
“They leave with a smile,” Anaya said.
Info: Natalie Anaya at [email protected].
A child and medical professional work together to help a stuffed animal "breathe" during the Teddy Bear Clinic through Kootenai Health.
A boy learns about x-rays at a past Kootenai Health Teddy Bear Clinic event to make medical care less scary for kids.
Kids crowd around a stuffed animal hooked up to hooked up to medical equipment during Kootenai Health's Teddy Bear Clinic.ARTICLES BY CAROLYN BOSTICK
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