It\u2019s hard to believe the Front Street Clinic was once in danger of closing.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, two Filipino patients waited in the clinic\u2019s lobby and chit-chatted in Tagalog as they waited to be seen. Office workers ran back and forth, looking at charts. The nurse practitioner treated several patients.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt cracked so bad that I had to pull it out, but it won\u2019t crack back in,\u201d Michael John Townsend, one of the clinic\u2019s patients, said of the bruised thumb on his right hand in one of the clinic\u2019s examination rooms.<\/p>\n
\u201cOK, well, it\u2019s a good thing I have an X-ray order for you,\u201d Cynthia Mattoni, the nurser practitioner, responded.<\/p>\n
The future of the clinic, once on shaky ground, is finally looking bright. They have a new head nurse, a new status as a nonprofit, a new organization to handle management issues and accounting, a new federal services grant, and there\u2019s even a new sign outside above the sidewalk.<\/p>\n
All they need is just a little bit more money.<\/p>\n
The clinic recently launched a fundraising campaign, with a goal of raising $100,000 by the end of the year. But instead of seeking donations just to keep the doors open like last time, now they\u2019re doing it with their future in mind.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a little bit of a budget hole that we\u2019re trying to fill,\u201d Carl Heine, the president of the clinic\u2019s board and an emergency doctor at Bartlett Regional Hospital, said in an interview. \u201cBut we\u2019re also trying to develop a little bit of a small cushion that allows us to not have to struggle with cash flow issues, so that we can make sure that we can always pay rent and pay salaries.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe goal is not for the clinic to be having to fundraise regularly,\u201d he added. \u201cBut we need to do some fundraising to, again, stabilize our existence.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nTransition<\/strong><\/p>\n The Juneau community raised around $120,000 to save the clinic from closing in October 2013. Its parent company, SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC), had pulled funding for the clinic in a cost-saving measure, saying it cost between $300,000 to $400,000 a year to operate.<\/p>\n A plethora of social service related agencies (to name a few: the Juneau Coalition on Housing & Homelessness, the Glory Hole, Aiding Women in Abuse and Rape Emergencies, Catholic Community Service, Juneau Alliance for Mental Health, Inc., and REACH Inc.) banded together in response to figure out what to do.<\/p>\n The stakes were high: the clinic serves Juneau\u2019s most vulnerable populations \u2014 the poor, the homeless, the uninsured. Without the clinic, which provides cost-free health services, they would have nowhere to go to receive affordable healthcare, except the emergency room.<\/p>\n \u201cFor some people, we\u2019re the only alternative in town,\u201d Laura Lucas, the clinic\u2019s office manager and clinical services coordinator, said.<\/p>\n Through their respective organizations, the agency leaders were able to raise the $120,000 from the community \u2014 enough to keep the clinic operational for the next six months. SEARHC devoted $90,000 in federal grant money, as well.<\/p>\n The newly formed group of community members and doctors managed to keep the clinic afloat since that time, but it wasn\u2019t an easy transition. Services were slashed in order to make ends meet, such as dental and behavioral health services. Later on, there were staffing issues; the head nurse departed and the interim executive director left in December 2014.<\/p>\n The clinic began hiring temporary physicians to treat patients, but sometimes patients would go days or even weeks without a provider. It was frustrating for patients, who were treated by an unfamiliar face each time they went to the clinic. At each visit they had to recount their entire history, if anyone was available to see them at all.<\/p>\n \u201cFor a period of time, we had to turn people away because we were in between providers,\u201d Lucas said in an interview Wednesday.<\/p>\n And of course, there was the biggest issue: lack of funding. <\/p>\n The clinic successfully re-applied for the major federal grant that funds it, known as the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) grant, within those first six months. By August 2014, the clinic received its official 501(c)3 federal nonprofit status.<\/p>\n That was good news, but it actually presented another issue: No one on the newly formed board had any experience running a federally funded community health center.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of hoops that have to be jumped through for that, and there\u2019s also just a lot of issues just in running a clinic,\u201d Heine said. \u201cSo we did the best we could, but we kind of fell short in a few places in terms of keeping track of the money and keeping all aspects open.\u201d<\/p>\n Changes<\/strong><\/p>\n Earlier this year, the clinic fixed its management problem by contracting with Alaska Island Community Services, which specializes in running federally funded community health centers. AICS is now helping Front Street Community Health Center (its knew name, although the old name still sticks) meet all its grant conditions, and with administrative tasks such as accounting and payroll.<\/p>\n Last month, the staffing shortage eased as well. The clinic hired one of the temporary locum physicians, Cynthia Mattoni, of Cleveland, Ohio, as its new nurse practitioner.<\/p>\n Mattoni, who worked at a Wrangell clinic last winter for six months, said she decided to stay during her second work visit in September.<\/p>\n \u201cI was supposed to leave the 20th but by then, I said, \u2018You know what? I\u2019m going to throw my resume in (for the nurse practitioner job),\u2019 and I never left,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Mattoni treats about eight to 10 patients a day at the clinic. Sometimes, it can be as many as 16. The clinic has treated 600 patients since last November.<\/p>\n Diabetes, high blood pressure and alcoholism are the most common ailments she sees on a daily basis, she said.<\/p>\n \u201cEating healthy is very expensive,\u201d she explained, adding many of the patients can only afford junk food. \u201cAnd when you don\u2019t have anywhere to cook a hot meal, you\u2019re getting what you can.\u201d<\/p>\n She tries to encourage patients to make healthy life choices, something that can be hard for those without many resources. There\u2019s a social component to patient visits as well \u2014 many go to the clinic for free socks and personal hygiene products.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we can get them in here \u2014 anybody \u2014 we will do whatever we can: help them fill out their Medicaid information, try to keep them healthy, overall as a person not just medically, the wholistic care, as a person,\u201d she said. \u201cThat\u2019s what healthcare should be.\u201d<\/p>\n She said she likes to develop a relationship with patients. She tells them \u201cI\u2019m here, and you\u2019re not going to be without a provider again.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cEverybody needs healthcare,\u201d she said. \u201cIf you\u2019re breathing, you need healthcare. And this is a very vulnerable population.\u201d<\/p>\n Having a permanent nurse practitioner is a \u201chappy\u201d relief, office manager Lucas said. Other things fell into place as well.<\/p>\n Lucas said the clinic will soon be able to once again offer behavioral health services. The clinic just last month received that funding through an expanded services grant, $220,000 from the federal Health Resources and Services Administration. The grant will also fund case management services.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, the same can\u2019t be said for dental services, although that remains a huge demand among patients. She said the clinic is holding onto its dental equipment, should they receive more funding for that.<\/p>\n Funding<\/strong><\/p>\n With the management structure at the clinic for the past two years and having to hire temporary healthcare providers for the past year, the clinic exceeded its limited budget.<\/p>\n Heine said he hopes the community can help them out. So far, they\u2019ve already raised $31,890. And they have a $50,000 match from Northern Light United Church.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re actually pretty far along the way, with the $50,000 match,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Those interested can donate by visiting the clinic in person, (it\u2019s inside the Mercantile Mall on Front Street, up the stairs and next to Grumpy\u2019s Deli, Suite 202), or online at http:\/\/frontstreetchc.org\/donate\/<\/p>\n To ensure the money doesn\u2019t dry up again, the clinic now serves everyone \u2014 not just those experiencing homelessness or those who have low incomes. Heine said that will make the clinic more financially stable in the future.<\/p>\n \u201cThe long-term stability of the clinic is going to require that we have a certain amount of income from taking care of patients,\u201d he said. \u201cThe goal for the clinic is to have stable funding that\u2019s a combination of grant funding and income from patient care.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll take anybody, but we\u2019re not trying to compete with the private clinics in town,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Heine noted the clinic\u2019s mission will remain the same, and it will primarily serve the homeless, those with low-incomes and people who are uninsured or underinsured.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It\u2019s hard to believe the Front Street Clinic was once in danger of closing. On Wednesday, two Filipino patients waited in the clinic\u2019s lobby and chit-chatted in Tagalog as they waited to be seen. Office workers ran back and forth, looking at charts. The nurse practitioner treated several patients. \u201cIt cracked so bad that I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":430,"featured_media":5496,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[75],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-5495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/430"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5495\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5495"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=5495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}