MOSES LAKE — The fourth annual Bourbon & Bowties fundraiser raised more than $350,000 April 24 to bring more doctors to Samaritan Healthcare.

“The population in our hospital district is large enough that we’re about 22 primary care physicians short,” said Roberta Bigalk, executive director of the Samaritan Foundation.

The solution Samaritan is working on, Bigalk said, is a partnership with the Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine at Washington State University to bring physicians to the Columbia Basin to do their residency. Starting in 2029, Samaritan hopes to bring four or five new resident doctors a year.

 “The hope is that they come here with their families,” Bigalk said. “They spend three to four years, and they want to stay here because they love the rural community.”

Bourbon & Bowties featured a live auction; wine, beer and whiskey tastings; raffles and a competition among local restaurants and caterers to enrapture the taste buds of the attendees.

“You have two jobs,” Samaritan Chief Development & Communications Officer Gretchen Youngren told the 400 people who attended.  “One (is to) taste everything … If you love it, go back twice. The final instruction is to vote.”

Seven restaurants were stationed around the dining area, each offering a creation or two. Michael’s on the Lake had shrimp and avocado tostadas; the Columbia Basin Technical Skills Center students brought Kahlua pork crunch and pineapple right-side-up cake; and The Cow Path Bakery of Othello had carmelized onion and bacon pastries followed by chocolate raspberry trifle. The Samaritan Clover Cafe offered a prime rib revival and strawberry tres leches cake and Tacos El Rey brought carnitas sliders. Sonny’s Tavern in Washtucna brought one of its signature dishes, beefy totchos, which were nachos made with tater tots rather than chips.

Sonny’s took the prize for the best hors d’oeuvres; CBTECH took home prizes for best entrée and best dessert.

The overall winner, with more than 30% of the vote, was Cow Path Bakery.

Samaritan CEO Theresa Sullivan, who is set to retire in a few weeks, spoke about the new Samaritan Hospital, which opened this year.

“We’re not going to coast because this hospital, it’s not the end of the story,” Sullivan said. “It’s just the beginning. We have 55 acres of future in front of us. I like to call it the Field of Dreams. It’s a campus with room to grow. We’re going to strengthen emergency care; we’re going to continue to expand all our specialty and surgical services; we’re going to keep recruiting exceptional providers and bringing state-of-the-art technology to the people of this region.”

The Rural Residency Program is part of that vision, Sullivan said.

“It is truly an investment in the physicians who will care for future generations,” she said. “And it’s an investment in our rural communities across our whole region … This campaign will help us to build our rural residency center, where the next generation of physicians will work side by side with our professionals, and they will help equip rural communities across Washington state and the nation with the care that rural America not only needs, it deserves.”

Before the auction began, guests were treated to a video by the Samaritan Foundation about a young patient’s experience at the new Samaritan Hospital. Moses Lake resident Samuel Lustkas described the time he brought his infant son Wesley to Samaritan’s emergency room after a traumatic accident.

“When we first got to the hospital, within seconds there were 30 people there,” Lustkas said in the video.

“From the moment (Wesley) arrived, we knew he was in serious trouble,” said Samaritan Medical Director Dr. Matthew Lockwood, who was on shift at the time. “He was having difficulty breathing, he was in shock, he had serious wounds that were obvious from across the room.”

Samaritan Hospital is a Level 3 trauma center, which means they can handle a lot of kinds of injuries, but there are some patients who have to be stabilized and transported to a larger facility, Lockwood said. It took a scary two hours to get Wesley stable enough to be airlifted to Sacred Heart Pediatric Hospital in Spokane.

“I remember saying to the nurses that I did not think he was going to make it,” said Dr. Jonathan Violetta, the pediatric emergency surgeon at Sacred Heart.

Wesley did make it, however, after 41 days in the pediatric intensive care unit.

“I think a lot of things went right in this case from Samaritan,” Violetta said. “Most important is that they stabilized Wesley and got him to us. Those are not easy procedures to be performing.”

“Looking back on that day, even though we’re small, we have all the right tools and all the right people to help get the job done,” said Samaritan Surgeon Dr. Queenie McClelland. “No matter what, we can handle it.”

    Columbia Basin Technical Skills Center Culinary Instructor Nathan Bathurst puts out small containers of Kahlua pork crunch, CBTECH’s entry in the Bourbon & Bowties restaurant competition.
  

    Samaritan Healthcare CEO Theresa Sullivan speaks about the new hospital and the Rural Residency Program at Bourbon & Bowties April 24.
  

    Auctioneer Chuck Yarbro Jr. is joined on stage by WSU mascot Butch in the live auction at Bourbon & Bowties April 24.
  

    The team from Cow Path Bakery was named Best Restaurant at Bourbon & Bowties, beating six competitors with more than 30% of the vote.