What's Happening... Update from our July 18th Board Meeting. Take a READ!

1.  Job Opportunity- Our seniors need your help to stay in their own homes. Please contact Lynn Goodison at 250.551.7210 or lynnhomehelp@gmail.com if you are interested. 

2.  Thank you to Cheryl Whittleton of Interior Health for providing space, free of charge, in outlying community health centres across the region for the TEETH Mobile Hygiene Clinic starting in September.  More news to follow regarding locations, times, etc.

3.  2016 Senior Fair at the Prestige in Nelson on Sept. 30^th.  Stay tuned for details. 

Next meeting: Monday August 8^th at 11:00 a.m. in the Resource Centre.

Have a great summer,

Marion, Eric and Erin

Community First Health Co-op Annual General Meeting and the Kootenay Boundary Division of Family Practice

Health Co-op Chair Debby Zeeben reminds us what an amazing year of accomplishments we have to celebrate

The Community First Health Coop AGM was held on June 9, 2015 with a good number of members in attendance, After a welcome by Deb Zeeben,, where she gave us highlights for the year, the West Kootenay TEETH Low cost dental clinic is up and running Apple Tree Maternity is a collaboration of doctors, midwives and doulas to support families from pre pregnancy to post, and the Passport for Wellness Health Fair, she introduced our guest speakers for the evening.  Julius Halaschek-Wiener, Dr. Trevor Janz and Grace Nakano representing the Kootenay Boundary Division of Family Practice.  

The Kootenay Boundary Division of Family Practice has 100% of family physicians in the area developing a vision for sustaining health communities with health care providers in the region.

Debby introducing our speakers

Julius spoke about working together with practitioners, IHA and Ministry of Health and local community doctors to look at the best ways to provide care for the community. The Division is 5 years old and operated on consensus and true collaboration, a place where the right people are needed to work together.

He also spoke on the GP for Me initiative to recruit and retain family doctors so that everyone can have a doctor.  It also involves improving practice efficiency of practices, optimizing Integrated Primary Community Care, team-based care and a GP for Me Hotline.

Currently there are 4 residents in Trail and 2 in Nelson who are interested in rural medicine and in coming to work in our communities.  There will be a community-supported initiative to put together a team to work on recruitment of physicians to our area. There are currently 2 doctors in the Nelson area taking new patients, but they are becoming full quite quickly.

IPCC ( Integrated Primary Community Care) would include a nurse, dietitian, social worker along with the doctor.  Team-based care would see a social worker embedded in each medical clinic. Currently there is a social worker at the Nelson Medical Clinic under the direction of Dr. Lee McKay.   They are looking at the sustainability of this pilot project. The GP for Me Hotline is given out at emergency if the patient does not have a family doctor or through Mental Health, and when they call the number, a  person will try to hook them up with a physician in their area.  

These are exciting initiatives as BC looks to envision a new way to work with primary care.

The next speaker was Dr. Trevor Janz, who has been an ER doctor in Nelson for over 25 years and is also responsible for the elderly frail in care homes in the area.  He is interested in improving the quality of care for “frail” seniors.   His work in the area of polypharmacy was both fascinating and substantiated in making a difference. He explained that polypharmacy is "when the total negative effect of medications is more than the positive effect on the illness”.

The statistics that he gave on the use of anti psychotic drugs was mind boggling. In Canada if you are 65 and older and living in your own home, then 26% will be on 10 or more medications and 15% will be on 15 or more medications.  However, if you are in a long-term care facility, then 61% will be on 10 or more medications and 21% will be on 15 or more.

Before the work on reducing the medication began in the Kootenay area it was found that 65% of patients in Castlegar, 53% in Trail and 16% in Nelson in long term care homes were using 10 or more medications.  Currently that number has now been reduced to 12% in Castlegar, 22% in Trail and 9% in Nelson. 

This is an initiative that is across BC and Share Care, where practitioners are conferencing once a month, up to 75 of them, both nurses and doctors, and working on using many experts to make a difference.

It is more difficult he admits, to dealing with seniors in their own homes and in assisted living facilities, but they are chipping away at it.

Grace Nakano is a Nurse Practitioner based with Mental health in Nelson and Trail who support the most vulnerable people with mental health issues on the streets, in shelters and at food banks.

A nurse practitioner will have extended training after nursing and is able to write prescriptions, refer patients to specialists, order x-rays and perform extended nursing duties.

She works with high risk clients and meets them at the Salvation army, Food cupboard, Our Daily Bread or on the streets or shelters. She is also at LV Rogers high school once a week to meet with students who have mental health challenges that are referred by the school counselors.

There was excitement in the air after the presentations as people were optimistic about a new level of care for all.

Julius shared with us the Strategic Initiatives for 2014-15 including their Core Principles

The AGM was very brief, and with a quorum present all was approved. 

 A big thank you was extended to our 3 board members who have filled their terms or have retired from the board, Sharon Browning, Sarah Popoff and Joan Reichardt

A welcome extended to our two new Board members:  Karen Hornby, who is a nurse and Erin Morrison who is a health coach. We look forward to a good year for CFHC.

Karen

Erin

We have one more meeting before September and so we wish you all the great summer and, although we may do one or two more blogs, we too will take some time to relax and recharge.

Marion and Eric

The Latest from Our Community First Health Co-op Board February 2015 Meeting

Highlights of Meeting

The Community First Health Co-op (CFHC) has recently received two interesting proposals for building our network relationships from activity on our revitalized website. The website, along with our brand-new Blog, has provided an opportunity for people around the world to see the community-focused work that our Co-op does to support healthy living for our residents.

Here are two recent proposals that sprung for our internet presence:

The B.C. Women’s Foundation in Vancouver is offering a free program in Nelson called Osteofit for Seniors and CFHC has accepted the invitation to host the training.

The Alberta Co-operative Association has contacted CFHC asking for help to prepare their presentation to the Alberta Minister of Health on the CFHC model for communities in Alberta.  They have taken information from our website and Deb, the board chair, sent organization charts and other items.

The British Columbia (B.C.) Dental Association has invited a representative from the low-cost dental clinic, along with Mara Sand of Interior Health, to their symposium in Vancouver that focuses on non-profit dental clinics.  Interior Health has provided financial support for Mara to attend while the Dental Society provided travel reimbursement for the West Kootenay TEETH Clinic Society rep to attend.

Keep in touch and drop us a comment...

Eric and Marion