Gamers for a good cause

BY COLLEEN LUTOLF
Staff Writer

CHRIS KELLY staff Raymond Ostapowycz, owner of the Digital Nexus Center in Brick is fixing old and broken gaming systems so he can donate them to local hospitals. Ocean Medical Center in Brick has already requested a system, Ostapowycz said. BRICK - Got an old Nintendo and a few copies of Super Mario or Legend of Zelda taking up room in a closet?

Give them to Raymond Ostapowycz. He's collecting that stuff - for a good cause.

Ostapowycz, a Brick resident and owner of the Digital Nexus Computer Center on Van Zile Road, is collecting old video games and gaming systems, fixing them up and shipping them off to The Get Well Gamers Foundation.

The nonprofit, based in Huntington Beach, Calif., will then redistribute the collected games and systems to hospitals throughout the country including some here in New Jersey.

"I wanted to help after reading about what they're trying to do. I remember when I was a kid thinking about how much I played video games," said Ostapowycz, 34, a gamer since the 1970s. "For kids that are stuck in a burn center - what is there for these kids to do? Video games help kids use their minds and keep their minds active."

Ostapowycz is not only collecting the games; he's taken his fundraising efforts one step further by attempting to enter some local hospitals in The Get Well Gamers Foundation network.

Ostapowycz learned about the foundation through i-games, a gaming hardware maker that is sponsoring a fundraising competition among gaming stores throughout the country.

Ryan Sharpe, the 24-year-old president of The Get-Well Gamers Foundation, founded the organization in 2001.

Sharpe had been admitted to an Orange County hospital during his eighth bout of pneumonia, when he learned Donkey Kong Jr. had been installed on his unit, he said.

"The only entertainment I had prior to that is 'Price Is Right' reruns on TV," Sharpe said. "I'd wheel my I.V. stand down there and lose myself for hours. It would totally obliterate the dead time. Then later on, one of my other friends said he was in the hospital for a month and would've killed to have had video games. He said somebody should do that - put video games in hospitals and I said, 'Why not us?' That's whole got started."

Hospitals throughout the country have received gaming systems from Sharpe's foundation, including St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Tennessee and St.

Luke's Hospital in Missouri.

Soon, Ocean Medical Center in Brick may be added into the Get Well Gamers roster of receiving hospitals.

Ostapowycz enlisted the help of fellow gamer Eric Froehlich, 19, of Brick, who often hangs out at Ostapowycz's shop. Froehlich has been calling area hospitals, asking if they'd like free gaming systems for their pediatric units.

"I think it would help give kids something to do, so they don't have to sit in bed all day long thinking about bad things," Froehlich said.

Five area hospitals have been receptive to receiving the used systems, Ostapowycz said, including Ocean Medical Center in Brick, Jersey Shore University Medical Center in Neptune, and Riverview Medical Center in Red Bank.

"It will be wonderful," said Jacquie Stanley, a pediatric nurse manager at Ocean Medical Center "It helps keep them busy during the long hours when there's nothing to do here. It distracts them from being ill and stuck in the hospital, thinking about their I.V.s and that kind of thing."

Brick's pediatric unit has one PlayStation that was donated, Stanley said, "but you can have more than one child that wants to play. It keeps them distracted, especially when they don't have visitors, when visiting hours are over and they're bored."

Ostapowycz has not received any old systems yet, but he said he might start going to yard sales to pick up some used machines.

"You can get systems for $2, and then I'll just donate them," he said.

"If they're not using it, they may as well donate it for the greater good instead of letting it sit there and collect dust," Froehlich said.

Ostapowycz will take any gaming system, no matter what its condition.

"Even if I can't fix it, I can always use the parts that come in," he said.

Anyone interested in donating a used game or gaming system may drop it off at the Digital Nexus Computer Center, 137 Van Zile Road, or call the shop at (732) 458-1337.