By Daphne Sashin
Mary Lau, RN, MHA, was already 81 years old when she started working as a secretary at the Renewal Center at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP). Now the hospital’s oldest employee at 89, she’s a familiar face to anyone who stops in for a break.
“People often come up to me and say, ‘I know you,’” said Lau, who stands just shy of five feet. “I don’t always remember people’s names, but I’m always so touched that people know me.”
Lau greets visitors, keeps the office and computer workstations organized, and keeps the line moving for massage chairs moving. Before the pandemic, she maintained the center’s exercise and yoga class schedules and coordinated meeting space for CPR trainings and other activities.
Lau’s attachment to HUP and Penn Medicine began as a grateful patient. In 2000, she developed pancreatic cancer and underwent surgery by the late Ernest F. Rosato, MD, followed by a year of chemotherapy and two months of radiation under the care of oncologist Daniel G. Haller, MD. She felt so indebted to Penn Medicine for saving her life – and so impressed with the care and service she had received – that she and her late husband, a public defender with the state of New Jersey, donated an infusion room at the Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine (PCAM), followed by several other institutional gifts.
Lau has overcome many challenges. Having graduated college in Taiwan when the island was under the tumultuous rule of Chinese Nationalist commander Chiang Kai-shek, Lau left for the U.S. to pursue her interest in business administration – only to find that the scholarship Cornell University had offered her wasn’t nearly enough to cover her MBA program. Instead, she went to nursing school because a New Jersey hospital was offering a three-year nursing scholarship.
She later obtained both a master’s degree in health administration and an associate’s degree in computer science, and held positions as an assistant hospital administrator, a nursing home inspector for the state of New Jersey, and ultimately, bureau chief for the Medicaid division’s long-term care billing system. When she turned 60, she retired from the state of New Jersey and got a job as a systems analyst for PNC Bank, where she stayed 16 years.
Mary Lau with her husband, left, and the late Ernest F. Rosato, MD, at a fundraising event.
After retiring from PNC, Lau joined HUP’s volunteer Patient and Family Advisory Council (PFAC), which is how she learned about the Renewal Center. When she saw that the center still had a handwritten sign-in system, she offered to automate the process; the former director hired her to work part-time at the age of 81.
“Working gives me a purpose to wake up in the morning, gives me the opportunity to meet people, and keeps my mind off my health problems,” Lau said.
She now lives in Philadelphia and takes the bus to HUP a few mornings a week as her health allows. Her boss, Jessie Reich, MSN, the hospital’s director of Patient Experience and Magnet Programs, said it’s been an honor to have worked alongside Lau these past years.
“I have learned so much from Mary,” Reich said. “I particularly admire her determination, grit, and kindness.”
Even as her declining health has forced her to slow down, Lau is always one to help out. During this year’s Nurse’s Week, she stayed late to count out shirts, vinyl stickers, and badge reels to distribute to 5,000 staff.
“HUP has been a significant part of my life. I am blessed to be an employee, but I am even more blessed for the wonderful and dedicated care that the hospital administers,” Lau said. “I am forever grateful to HUP and the doctors and nurses who have gotten me to my 89th birthday.”