Update for Week ending
October 3, 2009
Breaking News - Hoonah Clinical Operations. SEARHC began direct care operations at the Trudy Wolfe Clinic in Hoonah on Thursday, October 1st. We successfully recruited the Community Health Aides/Practitioners, front office, and behavioral health staff. Kurt Welser, SEARHC Physician Assistant from Prince of Wales Island, will be in Hoonah for the first month of our clinical operations. He will assist our health aides/practitioners and provide some after hours call. We are continuing to recruit for a midlevel provider (physician assistant or nurse practitioner) and a building attendant. The new SEARHC staff received orientation from Human Resources and medical direction support (Dr. Vastola/Steve Gage) this week. The Tribal Council with the Hoonah Indian Association hosted a dinner for our new staff and members of our transition team on Thursday evening.
SEARHC Annual Report. SEARHC’s annual report was updated for the Alaska Native Brotherhood/Alaska Native Sisterhood Grand Camp in Juneau. Our Annual Report focuses on quality this year. The report describes quality for our people, facilities and system of care, as well as sharing information on the sources of revenue and expenditures for our organization. The annual report can be found at http://www.searhc.org/downloads/2009SEARHCAnnualReport.pdf.
Dr. Scott Joins ELMC. We have very positive news with Dr. Jessica Scott joining the medical staff at the Ethel Lund Medical Center (ELMC). Dr. Scott is the fourth Alaska Native medical provider at ELMC. We are proud to say that 33% of our medical staff at ELMC is Alaska Native. Dr. Scott also represents ongoing work by Dr. Janice Sheufelt to mentor and seek meaningful opportunities for medical students and graduates in the health field with the long-term goal of recruitment.
Honoring our Elders. We created a new flyer to communicate some of the services for Elders throughout SEARHC. The Board’s Strategic Plan goal #3 includes identification and determination of services for Elders that SEARHC can provide. The flyer describes services and assists Elders on where they may find services throughout our organization. The flyer can be found at http://www.searhc.org/downloads/SEARHCElderServices.pdf.
Intensive Outpatient Therapy Grant Proposal Not Funded. Our Behavioral Health staff has designed and is seeking funding for substance abuse treatment using Intensive Outpatient Therapy (IOT) model. Essentially, IOT offers approximately 12 hours of outpatient substance abuse treatment for patients and clients. This type of treatment allows participants to remain close to home, engage in work activities, helps those that do not require residential treatment, and provides aftercare for participants returning from a residential program. We submitted a grant proposal for IOT earlier this year to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). We received word this week that our grant was not selected. We believe this outpatient treatment is an essential piece of the continuum for substance abuse treatment and will continue to seek alternatives to financially support this model of care.
Just a reminder. . . SEARHC frequently brings in traveling medical specialists to hold specialty clinics at our various facilities. Please click here to view our upcoming specialty clinic schedules.
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