Children's Hospital Patients Receive Gift of Reading

Elena Fuentes-Afflick with Emily Stackhouse

Pediatrician Elena Fuentes-Afflick stands with Emily Stackhouse at Cover to Cover in Noe Valley, which recently donated 200 children's books during Children's Book Week.

Three hundred UCSF Children's Hospital patients received the gift of reading last week in the form of 300 books donated to the hospital during Children's Book Week. Two hundred books were donated by local neighborhood booksellers Cover to Cover of San Francisco's Noe Valley, located near 24th and Castro streets. Store co-owner Tracy Wynne said the donations are an annual tradition. She estimated the books' value at about $2,000. "Each year, we select an organization to help," Wynne said. "We've been doing it for 14 years through our 'growing readers' program." This year, bookstore customers plucked the name of one of 200 "growing readers," blossoms on a "tree" that included the child's area of interest, in large part through the offices of Elena Fuentes-Afflick, MD, a professor in the Department of Pediatrics and an avid reader. Patients also received 100 copies of Snappy Little Thanksgiving. The pop-up books were donated by their publisher, Advantage Publishers, as part of a nationwide Children's Book Week campaign from Nov. 13 to Nov. 19. That donation is valued at about $1,300.