Calming Space For Cancer Patients Restored By McLean Eagle Scout

ARLINGTON, VA — A Langley High School senior's Eagle Scout project rejuvenated a calming space at VHC Health's Sid and Reba Dewberry Cancer Center in Arlington, where patients can find some respite as they undergo treatment.

"My project focused on restoring a cancer healing garden, and specifically pressure washing, getting new benches and planting new plants, which help in the medicinal side of helping cancer patients heal," Nuraz Hassan of McLean told Patch recently.

Hassan first became aware of the garden when his father introduced him to Dr. Sarah Mezban, a specialist in diagnostic radiology at the center, and Margaret Navarro, breast health navigator at VHC Health. He was looking for something he could do for center as an Eagle Scout project.

"While I was there, there were two options that I kind of saw for what to do my project on," he said. "One was a closet and reorganizing things. The other was the garden, which I had to walk through to get to the door. I just kind of noticed it and thought, 'Well, something can be done with this.' To be an Eagle Scout, there's always stuff to improve. That was kind of how my thought process worked."

Hassan financed the garden renovation with personal donations from his family and money raised via a GoFundMe campaign. He and his small team of volunteers were able to complete the project within a couple of days.

"It's been wonderful having youth volunteers come and help out with various things," said Navarro, who oversaw Hassan's project. "The garden, like Nuraz was saying, it was fine. It had plants and stuff, but when you started looking at it, it was very weeded over."

When the garden was originally planned, it was supposed to have plants related to cancer treatment, different medicinal herbs, according to Navarro. Some of those herbs were included among Hassan's new plantings.

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"Now we have three beautiful new teak benches there and some wind chimes," she said. "You can hear those wind chimes when I'm walking from the new outpatient building back over to our office area. I can hear them tinkling. ... It brightens our day. That makes our lives easier and more joyful."

The process of renovating the garden taught Hassan how quickly the community could respond to a positive change.

"We had just finished. We're cleaning things up," he said. "I'm getting ready to go. I look out in the garden and I see there's already somebody in there, already eating their lunch. And to me, what more can you ask for, really?"

Read about how another Eagle Scout project by a Langley High School student improved the wig fitting room at VHC Health's Sid and Reba Dewberry Cancer Center in Arlington.