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Friendly neighborhood health care
(by Karen F. Mrnarevic - February 20, 2008)
It’s about time the Board of Health gets a little credit.
Most people know the Board of Health as an enforcer of food safety protocol responsible for monitoring the cleanliness of eating establishments. But many people may not realize that the Board of Health is a community resource that provides numerous services, some free of charge, aimed at maintaining the health and wellbeing of local residents.
Public Health Nurse Lois Kohan, RN, has worked for the Hillsdale Board of Health for the past 17 years, and has seen the Board’s list of available programs grow and evolve with time to meet the needs of the community, something that is needed now more than ever with the closing of Pascack Valley Hospital.
“It’s an area of nursing that I really love, because it encompasses people from birth to death” in areas where there is a great need, says Kohan. She points out that each town’s Board of Health provides different services, depending on demographics. “Hillsdale has a large senior population - about 25 percent,” she says. As a result, “the question becomes, ‘What can we do to improve the quality of life for them?’”
The answer? A whole lot more than people might think.
Among the programs the Hillsdale Board of Health has developed that are geared toward the elderly and home-bound include the “Good Day Program.” The Hillsdale Police department participates in the program, which encourages residents who live alone to make a daily phone call to the police department, just to say, “good day.” If the person does not call by 11 a.m., the police dispatcher places a call to his or her house, just to check in. It’s a simple way for the community to stay involved with its often forgotten members, and make sure that someone is monitoring their wellbeing.
The Hillsdale Board of Health also runs a van service, which it shares with Old Tappan. The vans “transport people to stores, to the doctor, the dentist or the hair salon, at no cost. The town pays for it,” says Kohan.
There is an array of regular programs, which are available to all residents. These include the monthly “well baby” clinic, a child health conference for newborns through school aged children, which provides physical exams, immunizations and developmental monitoring. Since the closing of Pascack Valley Hospital (PVH), says Kohan, the child health conference has expanded to include a number of surrounding towns. “We are developing contracts with other towns so they can send children who do not have health insurance.” The clinic is a free service.
The Board of Health is a great resource for local individuals and families who do not have insurance coverage, says Kohan. “The state of New Jersey has Family Care, but sometimes people fall between cracks. If people lose a job and insurance, that’s when they can come to us.” NJ Family Care is federal and state funded health insurance program created to help New Jersey's uninsured children and certain low-income parents and guardians to have affordable health coverage. “We are here to help… We want them to know we are here.”
Kohan mentions that since the closing of PVH, she and other volunteers at the Board of Health have been working to expand service and create more programs. She says that nurses from PVH used to come to the Hillsdale House every other month to take residents’ blood pressure readings. Now that the hospital is closed, Kohan has taken it upon herself to perform the service. She also holds health education seminars for residents there and teaches a weekly low-impact exercise class. She believes that encouraging social and physical activities is vital to the health of seniors, and she has fun doing it.
On March 29, from 8 a.m. to noon, the Hillsdale Board of Health will hold large health fair at the United Methodist Church. Residents from all over are welcome to join. “Pascack Valley Hospital used to do two Health Fairs a year,” says Kohan, so Hillsdale wants to open its fair up to the whole community to compensate for the loss. The Board of Health has enlisted the help of a laboratory to provide low cost blood analysis, and there will be the obligatory blood pressure and hearing screenings. There will also be some surprising additions to the health fair lineup, including a therapeutic massage clinic, a lecture on nutrition by a dietician, and a pharmacist on hand to consult about medications. A doctor will also be present to administer the new shingles vaccine to those who are interested (at a cost). “This should be a good event and a happy time, and hopefully we will help a lot of people,” says Kohan.
The Hillsdale Board of Health is evolving, and Kohan is constantly on the lookout for new areas of need. Recently, Kohan sent out letters to residents of Hillsdale House and Westwood House senior facilities asking if anyone would be interested in starting a support group for people with Parkinson’s disease and their families. “We don’t have anything like that around here,” she says. “I’ve never started a support group, but I am willing to try.”
Kohan finds her job to be routinely stimulating and challenging, since there are so many facets to the care she provides. “There is a lot of social work involved,” she says. As a member of the Bergen County Municipal Nurses Association, she says that she learns a lot through networking with other nurses in the area. The ongoing education provided by the County Health Department keeps her informed on how to address current health issues in the community.
The level of cooperation among various public entities in Hillsdale helps Kohan to keep her finger on the pulse of the town, literally and figuratively. She does audits on all of the town’s school health programs, checking to make sure all the children are up-to-date with their immunizations. As a result, Kohan, who is also a trustee of the Helping Hand Food Pantry, works very closely with school nurses, making it simpler for her to identify situations in which parents might need assistance in caring for their children. “Sometimes this is how you find out about families who need food… We try to get services to people who need them.”
She says that it is this cooperation that enables her to have the greatest positive effect on people’s lives, making her job very fulfilling. Kohan is proud to call herself a Public Health Nurse in Hillsdale. “I know Hillsdale is a town with a heart, that’s for sure.”
Karen F. Mrnarevic's e-mail address is Mrnarevic@northjersey.com.
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