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Mt. Carmel outreach takes medical care to all who need it
By Tim Puet
Catholic Times
People in the Columbus area who are struggling with health concerns because they either have lost the medical insurance they had or can’t afford insurance don’t have to leave their medical problems untreated.
They can turn to the community outreach program of Mount Carmel Health, which for the past 15 years has helped people in need by giving them quality medical care at soup kitchens, homeless shelters, schools, and low-income neighborhoods.
Brian Pierson, Mount Carmel community outreach director, said the program is serving more people than ever because of the downturn in the economy and has just received a new mobile coach which will allow it to perform its services more efficiently in response to the increased demand.
The coach makes regularly scheduled visits to 10 sites around the Columbus area to serve people who lack health insurance and need care of immediate medical needs.
Nine or 10 Mount Carmel staff members are with the coach at each stop. These include a physician, three or four registered nurses, a nurse practitioner, a driver who also is both an emergency medical technician and a pharmacy technician, two bilingual case workers, one of whom can speak Somali and one of whom speaks Spanish, and a data entry specialist.
“We don’t do wellness checks or physicals, although if someone asks for something like a blood pressure check and has no other concerns, we won’t turn him away,” said Ladonya Christian, a nurse who regularly travels with the coach. “We’re here to work on a first-come, first-served basis with people who have the type of immediate medical concerns that need to be seen by a doctor.”
She said the most common complaints for which patients are treated at the coach include high blood pressure, diabetes, the common cold, and upper respiratory infections.
“Knowing they can come here at a certain time each week and receive free care keeps many uninsured people from feeling they have to go to emergency rooms or urgent-care centers and from having to pay for treatment there,” Christian said. “That benefits those people, while reducing the number of people going for treatment at the emergency rooms and care centers, giving them more time to deal with more severe cases.
“Once people are treated for their immediate needs on the coach, we link them mostly to federally qualified health centers, where there are doctors who receive funding to provide services to uninsured and low-income patients,” she said.
“Occasionally, we will refer them to outpatient clinics in the Mount Carmel system,” which charge fees based on a patient’s ability to pay. “It’s then up to them to set up follow-up appointments. They don’t always do that, but giving them the opportunity for continued care at minimal or no cost is our goal,” Christian said.
The coach now serving the Mount Carmel outreach program was unveiled on Feb. 13 at the Mount Carmel Foundation’s annual Champagne & Diamonds gala. The 39-foot-long mobile unit was prepared by Farber Specialty Vehicles of Columbus.
Douglas Stein, president and executive director of the foundation, said it cost $280,000, including equipment. It replaced a unit which was 12 years old and was showing signs of age, including breakdowns and other equipment problems which forced some stops to be canceled.
“Money for a new coach wasn’t raised easily, but was raised quickly,” Stein said. “People realized the urgent need to continue the services offered by this unit and opened up their hearts and their checkbooks.” Names of all those who gave donations for the unit are listed on the back of the vehicle. They include corporations, physicians, philanthropists, and other interested individuals.
All the equipment on the coach is new except for a machine which does X-rays of the body’s extremities – arms, legs, ankles, and feet. Christian said the new items include a machine to do electrocardiograms, an automated external defibrillator, and equipment to check basic vital signs, perform minor surgery such as removal of cysts and warts, and perform and complete some laboratory tests. Other tests can be performed on the coach and sent elsewhere for examination.
The coach also has a pharmacy license, allowing it to dispense antibiotics and other commonly prescribed medications. It does not dispense controlled substances.
“As a Catholic hospital, we consider the coach a practical example of one of the corporal works of mercy, visiting the sick,” Stein said. “I suppose you could say that we’re actually treating the sick and they’re visiting us, but it’s all in the Christian spirit that’s part of our mission.”
The foundation, which was founded in 1984, provides about $450,000 annually for the community outreach program. “It’s been one of our traditional areas of support because it’s one of the best programs of its type anywhere,” Stein said.
Christian said the program was started in 1995, mainly because of the vision of Sister Barbara Hahl, CSC, Mount Carmel senior vice president for system mission. It began with a group of nurses in a small van, and they quickly realized more services were needed, leading to purchase of the old mobile coach in 1998. Christian, who has been with the program since 2002, said another key figure in its success has been Dr. Jack O’Handley, its medical director, who has been part of it almost since the beginning.
The new coach usually makes two visits a month at each of 10 locations. These include Beulah Park, the Columbus Global Academy, the Friends of the Homeless shelter, the Holy Family Soup Kitchen, Mann’s Trailer Park on Stelzer Road, Mount Carmel’s MetroWest Internal Medicine unit, the Northland Church of Christ, the Open Shelter, the Salvation Army on South High Street, and the downtown YMCA.
It occasionally visits other sites for special events which include health screenings for children and adults and educational programs. Information gathered during these events is analyzed, and this has led to regular coach stops being scheduled at some of the sites.
Christian said a typical stop for the coach lasts about three hours, and about 20 people are seen. “Recently we’ve been seeing about 320 patients per month,” said Pierson. “”If that trend continues, the number seen for the fiscal year which ends July 1 will be between 3,800 and 4,000.
“That represents a 15 percent increase from last year. I’m sure most of this is because of people finding themselves without insurance because they’ve lost their jobs or no longer are able to pay. That shows how much the kind of service we provide through the coach and our other outreach programs is needed.”
The Mount Carmel Foundation is solely dedicated to the health and educational needs of the Mount Carmel Health System and provides funding to Mount Carmel programs that serve thousands of central Ohio residents.
Driven by a mission to ensure that everyone who seeks care will receive it regardless of ability to pay, it is unique in its ability to focus on the greatest, immediate needs of Mount Carmel that are ever changing to better serve Mount Carmel patients, their families, and members of the central Ohio community.
It is under the guidance, control, and sponsorship of Mount Carmel’s parent organization, Trinity Health, whose mission is to serve in the spirit of the gospel to heal body, mind, and spirit, to improve the health of communities, and to steward the resources entrusted to it.
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