WEDNESDAY, MAY 2, 2018
HERMISTONHERALD.COM • A9
LOCAL NEWS
URGENT CARE HOUSE CALL
Community
paramedics aim
to prevent return
visits to hospital
By JAYATI RAMAKRISHNAN
STAFF WRITER
Getting urgent health care
doesn’t always mean a trip to
the hospital.
For those just getting back
home and trying to recover,
there’s a simpler way. The
Community Paramedic pro-
gram helps patients with
in-home procedures, and
aims to reduce return visits
to the emergency room.
Jessica Marcum of the
Umatilla County Fire Dis-
trict #1 runs the community
paramedic program, in con-
junction with Good Shep-
herd Medical Center’s com-
munity health program. She
said the program gets refer-
rals from the hospital, the
fire department, and from
local doctors.
“If they’re concerned
with someone falling, or
haven’t seen their patient in a
while, they may be too busy
to get to them that day,” Mar-
cum said. The program, free
to patients, started in June
of 2017, and is available to
hospital patients through-
out Umatilla and Morrow
counties.
People recently released
STAFF PHOTO BY E.J. HARRIS
Paramedic Jessica Marcum, center, listens to Ellen Minardi, right, while visiting on Tuesday
at Regency Hermiston Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Hermiston. Also photographed is
community health worker Nazario Rivera.
from the hospital can call
any time they have a health
concern. Paramedics will
conduct home visits and per-
form simple tests, such as
urinalysis, complete blood
count and blood pressure
checks. They will make sure
a patient is taking the right
medicines.
“Forty percent or more of
people on Medicare are not
taking their medication cor-
rectly,” Marcum said.
They assess the safety of
a patient’s home, and advise
them on potential hazards
such as slippery rugs or the
need for hand rails.
Visits can be as frequent
as patients see fit.
“It’s kind of on a case-by-
case basis,” Marcum said.
“Some people we’ll see only
once, and others we check in
weekly for a month or so.”
“They offered to come to
my house and check on me,
just to ensure I was doing
OK and allay my fears if I
had any,” said Karin Gehlen,
a Umatilla resident who
had several hospital visits
throughout the winter.
Gehlen said she doesn’t
use the service too often, but
someone from the program
will call and check on her
from time to time.
Each patient will be seen
by a paramedic and a com-
munity health worker from
the hospital’s ConneXions
program.
They’ve been working
with Ellen Minardi, a Herm-
iston resident who had been
hospitalized for several bad
falls, for close to a year.
Community paramedics
will usually visit the patient
at their home, but will also
make visits to assisted liv-
ing or care facilities, if that’s
where a patient is staying.
“We generally try to fig-
ure out what to do to get
them back home,” Marcum
said.
Minardi is currently at
Regency Hermiston. At a
visit to Regency last week,
Marcum
and
commu-
nity health worker Nazario
Rivera checked in with
Minardi, asking her ques-
tions about how recov-
ery is going, and how she’s
adjusted to living in an
assisted facility.
Minardi said she’s found
the program useful, but had
to get used to the idea of
someone helping her with
basic tasks.
“When I broke my pelvis,
I was laying there actually
thinking, how am I going to
manage this situation?” she
said. “It took a bit of talking
for me to consider.”
But she said now she’s
glad she accepted the help.
“They make it easier at
times when it’s going pretty
bad in life,” she said.
The ConneXions worker
will put the patient in touch
with community resources
they might need.
“The main thing is pri-
mary care providers,” said
Rivera. “We help fill out
housing applications. Food
can be an issue, so we con-
nect people with food banks,
WIC, or DHS.”
They may also help
patients assess whether they
need to move to an assisted
care facility, or whether they
need in-home care.
The community para-
medics will also help refer
patients to other services.
Virginia Salter, a patient
who is being treated for
myelodysplastic anemia, a
condition that can progress
to leukemia, has used the
program once.
“I think they’ve kind of
left the ball in my court,”
she said. “I asked them what
I could call about, and they
said I could call them any
time I need if I’m not feel-
ing myself and need them to
check my vitals.”
Salter said she feels a lit-
tle reluctant to call because
she didn’t want to bother
them needlessly.
“I did find it helpful to
have a resource short of
911,” she said.
But Marcum encouraged
patients not to be hesitant
about asking for help.
“They can still call me
for reassurance,” Marcum
said. “If it’s something I feel
is more appropriate for the
doctor, maybe I can go out
and see if I can gather infor-
mation for the doctor.”
The program was funded
by the Local Community
Advisory Council grant in its
first year, and the department
just received an Eastern Ore-
gon Coordinated Care Orga-
nization grant.
Marcum said currently,
community paramedics see
15 or 20 patients, but there’s
potential for the program to
grow.
Contact UCFD for more
information about the Com-
munity Paramedic program,
at 541-567-8822.
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