HAVING been treated for an infection and forced to stay in cramped conditions, Sylvia Britt knows firsthand of the need for a new Albury-Wodonga hospital.
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So when she won $500 on radio 2AY's breakfast show quiz she had no hesitation in giving $100 of her winnings to Albury Wodonga Health.
"We need that damned hospital more than we need anything else, I think that's got be built and it's not only me that needs the hospital, everybody needs this hospital," Mrs Britt said after presenting two $50 notes to Albury Wodonga Health Foundation manager Gina Bladon yesterday.
In April, Mrs Britt, 78, was given aid at Albury hospital for an infected gall bladder and found herself despairing at the accommodation provided.
"They stuck me down in an overflow ward which is just not (right) and there's no room there, there's no closet in the side and the cubicle you couldn't move in it, the bathrooms aren't right," Mrs Britt said.
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"There was no curtain on the shower and the water was overflowing and there was no rails, it was just terrible."
"I wanted to help, I wanted to find out what was going on... and see where it was at," the Wodonga great grandmother said.
Breakfast show hosts Kylie King and Kev Poulton were on hand for Tuesday's presentation.
"The fact it's taken a pensioner who is 78 years of age to set an example of parting with $100 she won on a radio competition, to play her part in trying to get a new hospital, it just struck a real chord with me, thinking there would be people like Sylvia, feeling helpless, what can we do, relying on decisions that are out of our control, crossing our fingers, hoping for the best and I was just really inspired by her gesture," King said.
Ms Bladon said Mrs Britt's donation was much appreciated.
With a distinctive laugh and upbeat outlook on life, Mrs Britt has been a popular contestant on the quiz but in more than 50 attempts had never won it, with "senior moments" tripping her up.
But after suggesting she could ask the five questions of Poulton to score the $500, Mrs Britt came up with easy posers, such as 'what is the main street of Albury?' and won the cash.
It means she cannot play again for three months, but such is the listener interest in the retired shop assistant and motel cleaner, there is going to be a new segment Sylvia's Say each Tuesday after the 7am news.
Her devotion to 2AY is not surprising, given she met her husband Des through Discreet Dinner Dates, a matchmaking program on the station in the 1990s.
Meanwhile, Ms Bladon said tickets to the inaugural Michael Kalimnios Memorial Dinner on November 17 would go on sale in mid-September.
Money from the occasion will go towards purchasing a $20,000 ultrasound machine to help find the veins of patients undergoing dialysis at Albury Wodonga Health.
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