Clinics' Corner, Fall 2008 |
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Primary care office opens in SublimitySUBLIMITY—Residents of Sublimity have had a new option for primary care close to home since Sublimity Medical Clinic opened in March. The new clinic is located at 114 SE Church St. It is owned by Santiam Memorial Hospital, which also recently constructed a new building for its Mills City primary care office. In Sublimity, the staff of seven includes two primary care physicians: the married team of Drs. Eric and Amy Wiser. Dr. Amy Wiser said she and her husband wanted practice opportunities that are not common in combination: small-town primary care and obstetric medicine, including the opportunity to offer cesarean delivery. Neither physician is native to the West. Both attended medical school in Pennsylvania. But in the more rural areas where they wanted to practice, in too many parts of the country it’s hard to practice obstetrics. “This is an area of the country where physicians continue to do obstetrics,” Dr. Wiser says. “We wanted to be full-spectrum family physicians.” It was important, too, to have a family-friendly area to raise their 2 ½-year-old daughter, Elise. “We enjoy living here a lot,” Dr. Wiser says. “The community in general has welcomed us quite nicely.” Sublimity Medical Clinic is housed in a new building with nine exam rooms and a well-equipped procedure room. There is space to add an additional provider when patient growth requires one, says Carla Godell, office manager. “It’s a great location,” she says. “It’s easy to find and people like the natural light. “And we can look out all day long and watch people walking their dogs,” Godell says. “It’s really great.” Santiam Memorial Hospital’s primary care services now include facilities in Aumsville, Mills City and Sublimity. Physicians give OHSU medical students a taste of non-urban practiceStar Trek’s Dr. Leonard McCoy used to declaim loudly that he was “just a country doctor.” If he was, he was one of the few. In rural areas, physicians are hard to come by. In Oregon, 11 counties report less than one active doctor for every 1,000 residents; three of them report none at all. This summer, 17 second-year medical students from Oregon Health & Science University School of Medicine got an up-close look at the work and lives of family physicians in cities and smaller communities throughout the state. Selected members of the incoming second-year class spent one to two weeks in cities outside the Portland Metro area, where they will work and live with community physicians. The program, known as the Rural Family Medicine Experience, allows students to experience physician life in areas beyond Portland, where the OHSU School of Medicine is based. The Rural Family Medicine Experience is not the only program that gives OHSU medical students a dose of the country. Every third-year student has a rural rotation. This year, Dr. Scott Fry became the first physician in Milton-Freewater to host an OSHU student, Brenda Simpson. It does take time to supervise a medical student, Dr. Fry told the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin. “I enjoy it, but it is a big commitment,” he said to the newspaper. But he added, "We're going to be facing a large physician shortage. The hope is some will consider coming back. "These efforts, in the long run, they pay off." (Read the full newspaper story…) For more about health care in rural Oregon, see related articles in this issue of CareNews. Virginia Garcia, Oregon Health Care Quality Corp receive Regence Foundation grants The grants will support efforts to improve health care quality PORTLAND—The Regence Foundation has awarded three grants totaling $195,000 to organizations working to improve health care quality. Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Foundation, operating clinics that largely serve the medical needs of Latinos and farmworkers in Oregon's Yamhill and Washington counties, will receive $100,000 to implement an electronic health records (EHR) system. The EHRs will help Virginia Garcia in its efforts to create an electronic medical home for its patients. Oregon Health Care Quality Corporation (Quality Corp), located in Portland, has been awarded a $45,000 grant to help build a consumer-oriented web site about health care quality. The web site, operated by Partner for Quality Care (a project of Quality Corp), will support Quality Corp's mission to measurably improve health care quality in Oregon. The third award was to Seattle’s Puget Sound Health Alliance, to create a web-based portal to deliver performance results to Puget Sound area clinics. The Regence Foundation is the corporate foundation of The Regence Group. It was created in spring 2008 to recognize and promote practices that promote positive transformation of the health care system. For more information, please visit www.regencefoundation.org. WISEWOMAN program funded in Oregon Services to promote early detection and prevention will be offered through Community Health Center and Virginia Garcia clinics The Oregon Department of Human Services, Public Health Division, Office of Family Health has been awarded a five-year federal grant from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to decrease the risk of heart disease and stroke among Oregon low-income women. The program, called WISEWOMAN (Well-integrated Screening and Evaluation for Women Across the Nation), aims to reduce cardiovascular disease by promoting early detection, risk factor screening, risk reduction and access to medical treatment for low-income, uninsured and underinsured women aged 40 to 64. To participate, women must be receiving screening services through the Oregon Breast and Cervical Cancer Program. The grant will provide $612,000 per year for screening services that will include a family medical history, blood pressure, body mass index (BMI), cholesterol, and glucose tests. The goal is to determine risk factors for heart disease and stroke and to use behavioral-change strategies to improve diet, increase physical activity, live tobacco-free, and adopt other healthy behaviors. The WISEWOMAN Program will partner with the Community Health Center in Medford and the Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Clinics in Washington and Yamhill counties. Screenings are scheduled to begin in January 2009. For information about DHS Women’s health programs… For information about CDC's WISEWOMAN program… |
Welcome new providers
Providence is planning clinic in VancouverProvidence Health & Services is planning to open its first clinic in Southwest Washington by the end of the year. The facility will have up to four primary care physicians and be located inside an existing office structure at 315 SE Stonemill Drive, off SE Mill Plain Boulevard. Vancouver patients have been traveling to Providence clinics in Portland and Gresham. LifeWorks NW welcomes newest sitePORTLAND—LifeWorks NW has opened a new site in Beaverton. Now known as the North Millikan site, the facility was formerly run by Cascadia Behavioral Healthcare and is located just across the street from the LifeWorks NW’s Millikan site, which specializes in services for older adults. The North Millikan site will provide services to clients who have been receiving services at the site through Cascadia as well as to new clients of LifeWorks NW, said Mary Monnat, president and CEO of LifeWorks NW. The LifeWorks NW North Millikan site is located at 14195 SW Millikan Way. For appointments, call 503-645-9010. To reach the site directly, call 503-644-2545. |
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