Commonly available items for recipients

What items can I donate?

ReCARES accepts donations of clean, new, or gently used medical equipment and unused home health care supplies. All items must be in excellent condition and clean with no damage, dirt, corrosion, stains, or rust.

What items you can’t take?

Currently, we are not accepting knee/back/arm/leg braces, pharmaceuticals, IV fluids and IV supplies, feeding supplements, needles, syringes, ostomy supplies, drainage supplies, urinary supplies (such as catheters, drainage bags, etc.), respiratory supplies including oxygen and C-pap machines.

Sometimes, our volunteers might still reject “commonly accepted” items when you bring them to the site. We understand that this might be frustrating, but we ask you to understand that these decisions are made in order to better serve our operations. There are many reasons why we can’t accept them right now, such as:

• Storage Space
• Overstock
• Little demand or no takers
• Safety or hygiene-related concerns

Please, help us help by respecting these restrictions.

When can I donate?

Donations of equipment are only accepted during open hours at any of our sites. Leaving items at our doors at any other time jeopardizes our site leases.

What the press has said about ReCARES

Bay Area Newspaper Group Article “Making lives better by recycling medical equipment”

By Dr. Kate Scannell
Years ago, a patient was slowly wheeled into my examination room by her two laboring adult daughters. The patient’s wheelchair creaked and thumped as it rolled through the doorway — clearly an antique, and clearly an aerobic workout for her panting daughters. “The wheel’s broken,” one daughter explained. “We can’t find anyone who knows how to replace it, and we can’t afford a new chair.”
Later, during a private moment with the patient, she told me . . . Click here to read the entire article.