AKRON, Ohio — Dr. Robert Parry may not be a professional artist, but his work on hand-drawn bandages is making waves on social media. He doesn’t do this for the attention; the pediatric surgeon just wants to brighten up the day for his young patients.
“One of the challenges is using Telfa. Telfa is not the ideal art medium,” said Parry, who is also the director of trauma services at Akron Children’s Hospital. Telfa is an adhesive wound dressing.
Parry has been a surgeon for more than 30 years and has worked at Akron Children’s Hospital for 10 years, but he also enjoys being creative.
“I’ve always liked drawing and stuff, so it’s always been kind of fun for me,” said Parry.
Parry has found a way to bring his creativity into the operating room by making custom bandages for his patients.
“I just ask them before their case: Do you have a favorite hobby? Is there an animal you like? A video game? A sport you play? Something like that. Something you just enjoy,” he said.
And then he gets busy drawing.
Parry’s hope is that the personalized designs ease the minds of the children.
“It makes it fun. It’s distracting for them. They don’t have to think about what’s going on with the surgery. They get excited about this and don’t think about the incision,” said Parry.
Twenty-seven years and more than 10,000 patients later, Parry has drawn many characters.
“There’s Patrick (from the show SpongeBob), dump trucks, helicopters. Here’s a halloween ghoul that someone wanted,” he said.
Some requests are more challenging to draw than others, such as those for a Disney princess.
“They’re just brutal to do and get the facial expressions right with Telfa. It’s just crazy,” said Parry.
And sometimes, the drawing is so cool that the parents also want one.
“The dad loved it, and basically at the post-op visit, I had to cut one out for him because he wanted to take it home,” said Parry.
While he doesn’t quite consider himself an artist, he enjoys the smiles from his patients and their parents when they see their unique bandages.
“It’s fun. The families like it. They kind of get into what’s happening and picking out the whatever drawing they want.” said Parry. “It just makes things, you know, kind of happy.”
