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A Flash Of Lightning

Tribune photo by CHRIS URSO

Tampa Bay Lightning mascot Thunderbug visits with patient Berlin Waters, 14, while handing out copies of "Thunderbug's Great Adventure At University Community Hospital" Feb. 9. The Tampa Bay Lightning and University Community Hospital handed out copies of the book to young patients.

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By JOYCE McKENZIE

jmckenzie@tampatrib.com

Published: February 17, 2009

UNIVERSITY AREA - The venture was a team effort from start to finish.

A partnership forged between University Community Hospital and the Tampa Bay Lightning Foundation created a book intended to ease the fears of pediatric patients.

The booklet, "Thunderbug's Great Adventure at University Community Hospital," features the Lightning mascot's experience in the UCH's children's unit following a hockey accident in which he broke his arm and a couple of fingers.

Author Robin Robson Gonzalez gives a first-person account of what he encountered in the pediatric care center and what he learned to ease his apprehensions through his UCH guide, Tucandu "Candu" the Tucan.

Illustrations by Peter Bajohr of Pop Design Group show Thunderbug undergoing a magnetic resonance imaging procedure, receiving an X-ray and being wheeled past the center's receptionist desk created in the image of a Busch Gardens' Safari Bus.

Nurse Margie Boyer, the hospital's administrative director of pediatrics, said Gonzalez, Bajohr and Lightning Foundation Executive Director Nancy Crane walked through every section of the pediatric unit to get a feel for how to structure the book.

"We took pictures, and from there I went home and wrote the story, and Peter sketched the illustrations," said Gonzalez, a Lightning educational consultant who volunteered her time and talent for the project. "In writing it I had to think like a child."

Gonzalez noted that Bajohr devoted a full day to producing each page of graphics for the 34-page booklet that was unveiled Feb. 9 at UCH. Thunderbug, Lightning forward Jeff Halpern, costumed characters from Busch Gardens and pet therapist Susie Shalor and her dog, Bonito, were on hand to deliver copies to patients receiving pediatric care.

"This is one of the fun things that comes out of our mission of doing programs that make a difference in our community," said Lightning general manager Brian Lawton. "I love the vibrancy of it."

Crane hopes the book will be used as a calming tool for young patients for years to come.

"We could not have done this without the doctors, nurses - everyone on staff in pediatrics," she said. "And it really comes alive through Robin Robson Gonzalez and Peter Bajohr."

The book is the second of the Lightning's Thunderbug series. The first is "A Street Hockey Tour of Downtown Tampa."

Reporter Joyce McKenzie can be reached at (813) 865-4849.

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