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Dear NTH Friend,
As a friend and member of Nurses Transforming Healthcare you have been with us for months or even years now and we have so much more to share with you this spring! Whether you gave us money, ideas, or a thumbs-up, we want to personally acknowledge you as an important part of our success. We cannot thrive without you!
Things are starting to move along more quickly now. The project at Spicewood, Texas has gone amazingly well thanks to the efforts by our healthcare team of Candice Escobedo, Christine Elliot, and our directors and is now the prototype of what we want to create for America. Angela Huddy from the University of Houston is evaluating our work and we have been meeting with her weekly in continued collaboration.
Read below to see even more updates, announcements, and just released content highlighting how NTH is making collaborative work in the community a priority and demonstrating how the Adapted Public Utility Model is working in everyday lives! Thank you!
Who’s checking in on you?
NTH is! The year is off to a great start, some of you made resolutions to try something new, live a healthier lifestyle, or go back to school to get that degree you’ve always wanted. Whatever goals you’ve made for 2024, we are cheering you on and excited for what the year holds in store for you!
We want to know how you’re doing and what challenges have you been seeing in your patient engagement. What projects are you working on and what are your successes that we can celebrate you? Send an email with your story to Info@NursesTransformingHealthcare.org with the subject line “My Story” and you may be featured in our newsletter or social media spotlight!
Social Rx in Spicewood Progress Results
Check out this wonderful episode hosted by Frank and Gail of the The Spicewood Experience Podcast!
Our nurse practitioner is followed up by the project's director and a local client who is a recipient of the study's ambitions. Here’s your update on the study being made of the Spicewood residents who most need social services.
Answering the Call: Myer Family Charitable Foundation has Heart!
A fire on January 9th destroyed the Cordova home. They were literally on the way home from the hospital with their newborn twins when the family learned that their home had burnt to the ground. The family knocked on their neighbor’s door and The Myer Family Charitable Foundation as well as the Spicewood community, answered the call.
The generous gift from the Foundation was able to provide case management, community health integration, social welfare services, assigning a community mentor, home health nursing visits, private duty nursing services, and medical care coordination – as well as translation and immigration services.
We secured temporary transitional housing for the past 60 days with two different Airbnbs providing the family lodging until their new home and land became available. We were able to replace the father’s working tools so that he could continue his profession as a mechanic, securing several odd jobs in the interim. Our nurses spent a great deal of time with the family – even watching one infant for five days while the other infant was hospitalized with a high fever.
Their gift made a tremendous impact that will last a lifetime for the Cordova Family and we are so grateful for their support!
About:
The Myer Family Charitable Foundation is a private foundation located in Spicewood, TX. Its primary purpose is to fund charitable organizations and it anticipates making grants solely to publicly supported 501(c)(3) organizations. Last year, it made 42 grants to various organizations including NTH and The Helping Hands Project started in Spicewood.
Looking to the Future
by Emily Spenski, MSN-Ed, RN, CNE
Dr. April Phelps, DNP, RN, and Emily Spenski, MSN-Ed, RN, CNE are currently working through a needs assessment in Fremont, NH. This semester students are creating the survey tool - next fall students will be gathering the data. At that point an analysis of needs will be conducted, creating a deliverable to the town and having students brainstorm ways to bring clinical students into the community to address their top needs.
After this pilot town, our hope is to bring it to other areas, perhaps looking into a HRSA grant and starting a free mobile health clinic. They believe there is an opportunity when we give deliverables to the town for NTH to get involved and show them how a different payment structure could work for their benefit. Stay tuned as this next project continues to develop!
Recently our own Kathleen Bartholomew was featured on Healthcare Reinvention Collaborative’s podcast, click here to hear a clip of that conversation!
Healthcare Reinvention Collaborative is creating a collaborative network by connecting, amplifying, and supporting the innovators, the change-makers, and the ruckus makers to reinvent healthcare. Check out this incredible opportunity coming up in April to continue the conversation on how to drive healthcare for a better future!
A Patient Story: The Gift of Hope
by Annjeanette F.
Helping Hands is a major reason that I am getting back on my feet. I have Long Covid; with symptoms that are still not well understood by the medical community and no protocols in place for the complexity of this disorder. I was slipping into financial, emotional, and physical rock bottom.
I discovered Helping Hands from the electric company and was surprised to learn the Food Pantry was right down the street from me! I met Christi and Candice that first day. I was able to get healthy foods, some gas money, and they paid my PEC bill so my lights could stay on.
More importantly, they gave me hope, and promised not to let me fall through the cracks. They called to check up on me. I live alone and have been isolated since 2020. Candice came to my house and helped me organize my medications and identify the ones that may counteract with one another.
She helped me go online and get SNAP (food stamps), and other state benefits. Christi guided me towards other agencies that give specific help, like filing my taxes!
The empathy and kindness that I was given has helped me in ways that many might not understand. Hope is a powerful tool that guides and motivates. Having a community that supported me was the key to me getting back on my feet. I see how people get so overwhelmed they give up and become homeless, and mentally unstable. This organization intervened for me, before that happened.
I especially appreciate Christi and Candice for the extra time and effort they gave to me. Having someone that listens, believes in you, and is nonjudgmental, is so important.
The kindness that the entire Helping Hands community gave me is the reason I am currently creating my “new normal”. I will always need help, but I now have systems in place that will allow me to help myself. This is no small thing. My life is not so overwhelming, and I have found my path forward.
Helping Hands is needed during these difficult times. They “show up” and help people help themselves. I now have faith in humanity and in myself, again.
There are no words appropriate enough to express how much HH has done for me. We need each other, to know that someone cares, we need the physical presence of someone. Just a simple helping hand can save a person’s life.
Thank you