Powell’s free clinic will close Oct. 31

Posted 8/17/15

However, the volunteer clinic will continue operating in Cody, said Georgina Hopkin, chairman of the clinic’s board of directors.

“We’re not thrilled about closing this clinic, but we have no choice,” said Jack Webb, HMVMC executive …

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Powell’s free clinic will close Oct. 31

Posted

Volunteer clinic will continue to operate in Cody

After opening in Powell seven years ago, the Heart Mountain Volunteer Medical Clinic will close its Powell branch Oct. 31. 

However, the volunteer clinic will continue operating in Cody, said Georgina Hopkin, chairman of the clinic’s board of directors.

“We’re not thrilled about closing this clinic, but we have no choice,” said Jack Webb, HMVMC executive director. Still, “We’re going to count this (clinic) as a success. We’ve seen thousands of patients over the last seven years that wouldn’t have had access to medical care.”

Heart Mountain Volunteer Medical Clinic has seen a total of 5,300 patients since opening in Powell in July 2008 and in Cody in August 2011. The organization serves patients with incomes lower than 200 percent of the federal poverty guideline and without health insurance.

Hopkin said Webb and clinic volunteers are working to help patients currently served in Powell to transition either to the clinic’s Cody branch or to Heritage Health Center, which will open in Powell Sept. 1.

Heritage Health Center is a federally funded community health center that will provide health care services on a sliding-fee scale.

“The emergence of the CHC gives our patients other options,” Webb said.

Hopkin said making the decision to close the Powell branch of the clinic was very difficult.

“When you add everything up and subtract everything out, this was the right thing to do,” she said.

Hopkin said the volunteer model no longer works in Powell, where a lack of medical volunteers prompted the organization’s board to hire a nurse practitioner, and that has been costly.

Dr. Nick Morris, who, with his wife, Madelyn, spearheaded the faith-guided effort to establish the volunteer clinic, said, “It’s pretty simple: It was way too expensive, because we don’t have volunteer doctors. I think the doctors (in Powell) are pretty occupied with issues at the hospital — that’s my impression.”

Five or six doctors continue to volunteer in Cody on a regular basis, he said.

Added to that difficulty was a decline in local donations to support the volunteer clinic.

Morris said it is challenging for one community to support both a volunteer clinic and a community health center, as both must raise money locally to help sustain themselves.

He said a similar volunteer clinic in Cheyenne disbanded when a community health center opened there and grew strong.

“It is a fairly frequent occurrence in around the country right now,” he said.

Morris said the Wyoming Primary Care Association approached the volunteer clinic board three times “to see if we wanted to be a CHC, and now it’s just sort of happened.”

Hopkin said a letter will go out this week advising Powell clinic patients about the upcoming closure and their options for medical care in the future.

Webb said he will help patients transfer to either the Cody volunteer clinic or to Heritage Health, whichever the patients choose. He and clinic volunteers will work to make that transfer as easy as possible, he said.

Hopkin said volunteer clinic leaders are thankful that Heritage Health will be available to provide care for patients in Powell, but there will be some differences.

“They’re going to do a sliding-fee-based plan, where we charge nothing,” she said.

While the volunteer clinic is open on Tuesday afternoons and evenings in Powell, Heritage Health Center will provide care Monday through Friday.

“They’re very well funded, and community health centers are open 40 hours a week, and sometimes on Saturday” if staffing is sufficient, she said.

Hopkin said she has been in contact with Bill Baker, project director for Heritage Health Center.

“I believe he told me they cannot turn anybody away, where as we have to go through an eligibility process to make sure we were in keeping with the law and our contract with Powell Valley Healthcare.”

Under that contract, Powell Valley Healthcare has provided free or reduced-price lab and radiology services for Heart Mountain Volunteer Medical Clinic patients. For the fiscal year that just ended, the value of those services totaled $67,621.

“The HMVMC Board of Directors is pleased that there are options for our patients and is developing plans for a smooth transition of services according to the patients’ desires,” the board said in a prepared statement. “We thank our communities, donors, service organizations, churches, businesses, volunteers, and staff for all they have done to help us achieve our mission and to preserve this noble concept.”

Hopkin said, “We want the public, the community, everybody who supported us to know that we put a lot of thought into this, and we feel we achieved our mission. We feel it’s a time to celebrate, and not to mourn.”

Morris said, “We didn’t consider this a defeat. We consider it a success that needs to be morphed and modified a bit. ... (The volunteer clinic) did what it was supposed to do.”

Heritage Health Center will open next month and will offer reduced-price health care services to those who qualify, including former patients of the Heart Mountain Volunteer Medical Clinic in Powell.

Colleen Behrent, the center’s executive director, said she has been in contact with the clinic leaders, and they are working together to develop a transition plan for interested patients.

“We are doing our best to make sure that all of those people who want to find care in Powell” can do so, she said. “We want to let them know that we’re here for them if they want to come through our door.”

The clinic’s patients will be eligible for a sliding-fee scale, she said.

“The whole goal of Heritage Health Center is really to provide access to care for everyone in the community ... regardless of their ability to pay,” Behrent said.

The center will begin making appointments and accepting walk-ins on Tuesday, Sept. 1. But people are welcome to visit the center at 128 N. Bent St. before then to meet Dr. Juanita Sapp and enroll as patients, Behrent said.

Sapp began her employment with Heritage Health on Monday.

Heart Mountain Volunteer Clinic patients have two local options for health care after the Powell branch clinic closes Oct. 31: The volunteer clinic in Cody, or Heritage Health Center in Powell.

For further information about the Heart Mountain Volunteer Medical Clinic, contact Jack Webb, executive director, at 754-1142 or 307-272-1753, or Georgina Hopkin Chairman at 899-3143.

For more information about Heritage Health Center, call the center at 764-4107 or the administrative office at 764-4135.

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