Current Awardees

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Amite County Medical Services, Inc. (ACMS) is a Federally Qualified Health Center providing the only sliding fee scale medical and dental care in Amite County or the surrounding counties. Recognized as a model community health center, ACMS has been providing quality medical and dental services for more than 25 years to over 3,000 underserved individuals each year. ACMS upheld its commitment to the community during and after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in 2005. Although ACMS was without water or electricity for two weeks, they continued to pay staff and, as soon as it was possible, reopened the clinics to ensure that everyone in the community received tetanus shots, placed all evacuees on the sliding fee scale, and provided their medication free of charge. Amite County has grown by an estimated 500 to 700 people, mostly evacuees, who fall into the ACMS target population. The Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care grant will partially support the salary of a full-time nurse practitioner and will allow ACMS to monitor chronically ill patients on a monthly basis. Additionally, ACMS will provide two free screenings to identify individuals in the community with high blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol levels, or who are overweight. Such screenings will help ACMS inform people about its services and educate the community about disease management and prevention.

Identifying and addressing changing community needs for medical, dental and mental health care has been the mission of Epiphany Community Health Outreach Services (ECHOS) since its inception in 1998. ECHOS, which once included just one part-time staffer and some volunteer support, has grown to include an executive director and three full-time “client navigators” supported by 30 regular volunteers. Although over 90 percent of patient visits are for free or low-cost health or dental care services, ECHOS also provides domestic violence counseling and assistance in applying for Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). With an influx of 30,000 families displaced by Hurricane Katrina, ECHOS has seen a 15 percent increase in client visits over the past year. Volunteers began a Katrina support group immediately after the disaster. However, due to the complexity of the issues, ECHOS identified the need for a part-time professional support group facilitator. Developmental and mental health needs of children displaced by Katrina have been identified, but only 10 percent of those eligible have accessed services. Clients routinely cite lack of transportation to programs and lack of information about the existence of programs as barriers to service. With funds from the Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care grant, ECHOS plans to hire a licensed social worker and group facilitator to liaise with several community groups to ensure that children are receiving the mental health services they need. That social worker also will collaborate with individuals and families to assess health care needs, develop treatment plans and provide links to community partners for services. Additionally, the grant will allow a dental practitioner to provide an additional day of services each month, which will double the dental care ECHOS can provide for its clients.

Since 1896, Kingsley House has been fulfilling its mission in New Orleans, “educating children, strengthening families, building community.” Since Hurricane Katrina, many affected families have lacked the necessary resources to obtain adequate health care and sufficient food. Before the hurricane, nearly 20 percent of individuals were uninsured and 12 percent of households did not have a reliable supply of food. Those numbers have grown since, due to job loss and the rising cost of living. The primary hospital providing services to the uninsured closed in the wake of Katrina, severely limiting choices for care. Unfortunately, many families go without health insurance or enough food post-Katrina because they do not know they qualify for assistance. The Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care Program will fund Kingsley House’s Health Care for All (HCFA) implementation team. HCFA uses the “Walker/Talker Model” of community outreach to educate specific neighborhoods about the availability of Medicaid and food stamps. An estimated 800 people will be enrolled in Medicaid/Louisiana Children’s Health Insurance Program (LaCHIP) and another 300 will qualify and begin to receive food stamps. HCFA will help clients secure the necessary documents needed to apply for this assistance. Walker/Talkers will help eligible families complete the necessary paperwork at the family’s convenience.

Louisiana Breast and Cervical Health Program of the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center (LSUHSC) Foundation
New Orleans, La.

Louisiana has the highest breast cancer mortality rate in the United States but is only ranked 36^th for incidence of the disease. This discrepancy easily can be attributed to the lack of early detection services available in the state. Since 2002, Louisiana Breast and Cervical Health Program (LBCHP) has provided screening and services to more than 17,000 uninsured or underinsured, low-income women. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, nine of the twelve hospitals and 76 of the 90 “safety net” clinics in the New Orleans area closed their doors. The three remaining hospitals and 14 clinics are overwhelmed with cases of breast cancer; few resources remain for early detection and prevention services. LBCHP has been providing free screenings via mobile mammography services, but this is not enough: The foundation has an 850-name, year-long waiting list. The Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care Program will provide support for the LBCHP’s newly established New Orleans Breast Cancer Early Detection Clinic to have a full-time radiology technician to conduct mammograms. The clinic will raise the capacity of LBCHP by serving 3,000 women per year. Women with abnormal tests will receive a case manager to guide them through the diagnosis and aid in finding and beginning treatment in a timely manner. LBCHP expects 75 percent of all patients needing treatment will have begun such treatment within 60 days of being diagnosed at its clinics. The New Orleans Breast Cancer Early Detection Clinic will help LBCHP realize its goal of preventing unnecessary disease, disability or premature death due to breast cancer.

When child abuse is investigated, children are asked to recall details of their abuse for law enforcement, social workers and service providers. Each time an abused child is asked to repeat his story, he is forced to relive the violence he has experienced. The children suffer physically and mentally when the various agencies involved do not share information or cooperate to provide appropriate medical or psychological intervention in a timely manner. The MS Children’s Justice Center, Inc. (MS CJC) was established to facilitate coordination between the investigative, legal and medical aspects of a child abuse investigation. In 2003, the MS CJC Child Abuse Referral and Examination (CARE) Clinic opened its doors, one half-day per week, to provide services for sexually abused children. Within two years, it was operating full time, five days per week, serving children from Mississippi and Louisiana. The CARE clinic is linked via the University of Mississippi Medical Center TelEmergency system to 10 rural hospitals. This telemedicine model allows for nurse practitioners to work with physicians, via an in room television/camera device, to provide real-time consultations to children in rural areas. However, the distance to Jackson from other areas remains a barrier to service. The Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care Program will aid MS CJC in establishing two satellite clinics, one on the southern coast of the state and one in eastern Mississippi, to provide expert, non-invasive forensic exams of abused children. The satellite programs will be connected to CARE for peer reviews of all medical examinations. The results will be shared in multi-disciplinary team meetings, providing law enforcement officials and social workers with information to ensure appropriate permanency-plans, medical services, and mental health assessments for the abused child. The MS CJC will collaborate with a doctoral student from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health to develop a comprehensive system to track children, services and criminal case outcomes. Monitoring the program’s success will provide policy makers with needed information about the tragic effects of child abuse on physical and mental health and well-being.

Pointe Coupee Better Access Community Health (BACH) has proven effective in providing medical assistance and diabetic services for residents in Pointe Coupee Parish, La. Because the area was in the direct evacuation route of Hurricane Katrina, thousands of displaced citizens of Louisiana permanently relocated to Pointe Coupee Parish in August 2005, causing the population to increase by 10 percent. This medically underserved area is designated as a Health Professional Shortage Area by the government for primary care, dental care and mental health services. BACH has filled these needs since 2005 by providing an urgent care weekend clinic, a podiatry clinic, transportation services, medication assistance, mental health services and diabetes care. The Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care Program grant will enable BACH to focus on diabetes care and education in Point Coupee Parish, as diabetes is one of the top three leading causes of death in the area and is the fifth leading cause of death in Louisiana. The funds will allow BACH to hire additional staff members to promote diabetes education in the local community and schools. The organization also will provide medical transportation for patients with diabetes and will strive to accommodate all such patients requesting prescription assistance. Additionally, a nurse and diabetes educator will be hired.

The Second Mile Mission Center was established in 2001 to provide health and dental care, financial assistance, food, clothing and house wares to the underserved population outside Houston, Texas in Fort Bend County. The organization was put to the test when it became the central hurricane relief agency for the region after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. Since late 2005, the population of Fort Bend County has increased by 100,000; many newcomers are unemployed or underemployed. One in four families in the county live at or below the national poverty level and over 75 percent of Second Mile’s patients earn less than $20,000 per year. The Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care grant will enable Second Mile to meet the growing need for affordable health and dental care for uninsured people living in the area by increasing the medical clinic’s days of operation and accelerating the growth of the new dental facility. Along with health care needs, Second Mile will continue offering patients access to the Center’s social and educational programs, resulting in a more holistic approach to care. Additionally, grant funding will allow the organization to launch a Class D pharmacy, ordering prescription medications from other states via mail, to provide medications to clinic patients. Second Mile will hire a part-time pharmacist and solicit volunteers from local schools to help run the pharmacy.

The mission of Sight Savers of Alabama is to provide comprehensive eye care and follow-up care to economically depressed children in Alabama. Founded in 1997, Sight Savers has coordinated eye care (including exams, glasses, vision aids, surgery and other treatments) with referral agencies and vision care providers in the Children’s Eye Care Network for more than 2,600 underserved children in the “Black Belt” region of the state. Major characteristic of Black Belt counties (which are centered in western Alabama between the Appalachian foothills and the coastal plain) include high unemployment rates, low education levels and limited access to health care. Many schools are underfunded, and nurses in those educational facilities are underrepresented. With the increase in population following Hurricane Katrina, Black Belt residents, especially children, are in desperate need of vision and health care assistance. Sight Savers will use funding from the Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care grant to focus efforts on delivering initial vision care to approximately 6,550 sixth-grade students and follow-up care to at least 1,600 of those children. Children will be treated by local eye care professionals whenever possible. In the absence of local eye care, ophthalmic equipment owned by Sight Savers will be used to create a mobile pediatric eye clinic. Volunteers from the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) and other eye care professionals will staff these clinics.

St. Charles Community Health Center provides accessible high quality health care to the underserved population in the Greater New Orleans area. Subsequent to Hurricane Katrina, prenatal care for the underinsured and uninsured populations has become extremely difficult to access due to the reduction in capacity and closings of previously available facilities. St. Charles Community Health Center recognizes the need for services to the Hispanic population. The number of Hispanics residing in this area has grown due to migration for work in the rebuilding and recovery of New Orleans and the surrounding region. Hispanics are the largest and fastest-growing ethnic group in the United States and almost one-quarter of the babies born in America are of Hispanic origin. Nearly one out of eight Hispanic babies are born prematurely, and the preterm birth rate in this population has grown more than eight percent in the last decade. Louisiana has limited resources and experience in dealing with the prenatal care needs for the undocumented and uninsured Hispanic population. The Centering Pregnancy Program, which will be implemented with the Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care grant, is a model of care that addresses issues caused by a lack of health care, providing affordable prenatal care to women unable to afford such treatment. The program will replace an individual 10 minute visit with a 90-120 minute forum between eight to 10 women and a health care practitioner. Extended time with a practitioner helps ensure that questions are answered and that women are secure in their pregnancies.

Tombigbee Healthcare Authority Operating Bryan W. Whitfield Memorial Hospital
Demopolis, Ala.

The destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina was not just material devastation of buildings and structures. People with medical conditions are still experiencing repercussions from the natural disasters. Many of these people migrated to rural, west-central Alabama after the hurricanes. They are in need of health care treatment, education and transportation. Tombigbee Healthcare Authority Operating Bryan W. Whitfield Memorial Hospital (BWWMH) will use funds from the Johnson & Johnson Community Health Care grant to implement “Coordinated Approach to Total Congregational Healthcare” (CATCH). The project will improve access to health care for hurricane victims in this region by executing three specific programs:

Churchgoers in rural areas will have the opportunity to be trained in basic first aid, CPR, and blood pressure and blood sugar checks. Nurses will administer the training on a rotating basis.
A health assessment survey will evaluate the number of people in local churches who developed diabetes, hypertension or heart disease since Hurricane Katrina, and were unable to be treated. After the results are gathered, three community-wide meetings will be held in all targeted counties; the community will have the opportunity to express its needs and the outcomes expected after the project is implemented. Nurses will provide assessments, referrals, health education and counseling following each meeting.
Transportation will be available for those needing or wanting to attend doctor appointments, pharmacy visits, meetings or community events that promote healthy living.

2007 JOHNSON & JOHNSON COMMMUNTY HEALTH CARE PROGRAM
LEADERSHIP AWARD RECIPIENTS

Rev. John Raphael Jr. (ENOUGH! Initiative) &
The New Hope Baptist Church
New Orleans, La.

During the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans learned that rebuilding and recovery are possible. The Rev. John Raphael Jr. and his congregation at the New Hope Baptist Church began the ENOUGH! Initiative to bring that can-do, self-help ethic to their neighborhood. By empowering individuals to make changes in their own lives, Raphael believes that he can make the community healthier on every level. In fact, his goal is to make New Orleans even healthier than it was before the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina.

Since Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans has become the per capita murder capital of the country; and Raphael’s Central City neighborhood is, by all accounts, considered the most dangerous area of the city. Raphael and his congregation at the New Hope Baptist Church have taken a stand, showing that they will not sit by and watch as the community kills itself off, one by one. Through the ENOUGH! Initiative, they hope to put an end to the drug addiction and sense of isolation that creates an environment where crime runs rampant and murder is commonplace. In cooperation with several other religious groups in the area, ENOUGH! is working to change the mindset of a community trapped by hopelessness. The systemic problems at the heart of the epidemic violence--a failing educational system and the lack of job training, employment prospects and chances for people to change their own lives--were exposed in the wake of Katrina. Raphael wants to address these root problems to make a long-lasting change in the health and well-being of his community.

“This is an opportunity,” as Raphael describes it, “for New Orleans not to just get back to normal but to move toward what it can be. Not to move back to pre-Katrina conditions, but to move forward to its post-Katrina potential.”

Raphael knows that, although the ENOUGH! Initiative was created to end homicide on the streets of New Orleans, no real changes can be made as long as the community continues to live in fear of violence and despair that nothing will ever change. ENOUGH! is restoring hope by connecting people to drug rehabilitation programs, opportunities for education, recreation and vocational training. However, the level of need outstrips available programs.

The “Way Out Program,” with the tag line, “You can begin again,” is Raphael’s newest effort in the ENOUGH! Initiative. The program brings people into the church who are looking to change their lives and provides a needs-assessment and options for next steps. The program has not been able to grow due to funding challenges and a dearth of drug rehabilitation or employment trainings programs for him to offer. The ENOUGH! Initiative sees the chance for city-wide healing and is calling for support from the community, the state and the nation to put much needed services in place.

In the meantime, ENOUGH! continues to challenge community perceptions. In response to a shooting just outside his church in late March, Raphael organized a 30-day prayer campaign. The congregation of several hundred people met nightly in parking lots or on street corners to pray and to show the community that they have had “ENOUGH!” of the violence. Their willingness to stand up to the violence paid off; there were no murders in the area during those 30 days.

Clearly, many physical, mental and social health changes must be made. However, in a neighborhood where speaking up is looked down upon, Raphael and those involved in ENOUGH! stand out in their dedication to exposing problems in order to solve them.

The Fleur de Vie (FDV) clinic is the Tulane School of Medicine’s first student founded, organized and operated community health care clinic. Operating jointly with the Tulane University Community Health Center at Covenant House (TUCHC), the free clinic delivers primary and preventive medical care to the uninsured and underserved people of New Orleans, La.

The creation of FDV is a response to the decrease of available, affordable health care in the region due to Hurricane Katrina. Several Tulane medical students who were relocated to Houston, Texas after the hurricane decided they wanted to find additional ways to service the health care needs of the New Orleans community. They began structuring a program that offered a mutually beneficial relationship between the underserved population in New Orleans and Tulane Medical Students. The students partnered with another post-Katrina-created clinic, TUCHC, to offer free medical care to those in need. TUCHC, which is open Monday through Friday, agreed to provide its facilities and supplies for the FDV clinic, which would be open on the first Saturday of every month.

FDV presents an opportunity for medical and social work students to expand their skills, both medically and executively, while simultaneously fostering cooperation between future health care professionals. Many of the medical students that work at the FDV were displaced from their homes after Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans. Some lost their homes and belongings and had to continue their studies at another medical school. Despite this, they wanted to give to the community and work towards rebuilding a better health system.

FDV is composed on 12 action teams under the direction of second- and third-year medical students who collectively facilitate the daily operational need of the clinic. These teams, which consist of a student from each of the four years of medical school or the Tulane School of Social Work, create programs for patient education, information technology, translation services and mental health. The students coordinate volunteer schedules; volunteers include faculty from multiple departments at Tulane University and other universities.

Patients are greeted upon the arriving at the clinic by medical or undergraduate students who assist the patients with completing an assessment of their needs for the day. Medical students who have been trained to take vital signs do so and the clinical team, generally consisting of two medical students, attends to the patients medical needs and consults with a volunteer attending doctor. Another team then meets with the patient to determine his/her mental health status, and a social worker is available for further counseling needs. Patients who need health education are visited by a separate team of students. Right now the students are focusing on diabetes education with a very strong education program. The medical students have also developed a satisfaction survey and are working with doctoral students to measure and monitor the quality of performance of care. Debriefs occur at the end of each clinic to determine if there are areas in need of improvement and to share lesions learned.

In the future, FDV plans to include students from the School of Nursing and the School of Allied Health.

For more information, visit http://fleurdevieclinic.org.