Our Purpose is to positively impact the lives of thousands of individuals in our community. Our mission is to improve the health of their lives.
The Foundation's goals are to:
- provide Registered Nurses in the area schools to care for 34,000 children.
- operate a free monthly children's medical clinic to ensure no child goes without treatment or a physician. More than 500 children have been seen by volunteer physicians, nurses and lay people.
- provide a free children's dental clinic. The dental clinic was started in February of 2003. Many chronic health issues are related to lack of dental care.
- ensure our elder's are not unnecessarily placed in long term care early by providing scholarships to Health Central Park's Adult Day Care Program.
- provide families with support and relief when faced with end of life issues through the creation of a Family Room.
- bring children and elders together to learn, love, and share their experiences with one another. This provides a "purpose" for our elders and a caring for many of our neglected children.
- assist with the purchase of expensive medical technology and expansion of healthcare services.
In a county where over 30 percent of the residents are under-insured, many of whom have children in West Orange County schools, the Health Central Foundation School Nurse Program aims to provide quality healthcare for more than 34,000 students in schools by treating the illnesses and injuries that would otherwise send students home from school and prevent parents from finishing the day at work. The School Nurse Program strives to care for children who might not otherwise see a medical professional, treat their injuries, whether physical or mental, and continue the preventive education needed to prevent school-wide epidemics like head lice and chicken pox as well as offer and maintain the follow-up care necessary for many of the students and their health. Registered Nurses, in the 30 schools that the program serves, care for 3.66 children on average per minute, per school day.
The Children's Free Medical Clinic, a partnership between the Health Central Foundation School Nurse Program, Healing the Children, Inc., and the Health Alliance, has aided in providing a place to refer impoverished children without physicians and continue the follow-up care often required after a seeing a school nurse. By referring the family to the Children's Free Medical Clinic, the child has opportunity not only to be seen by a physician but also establishes the only medical history the child might have.
Health Central Park offers the Park Experience and is truly a home for those who can no longer live independently on a short or long term basis. The Park, just like your home, has children playing, resident pets, gardening, special events, community programs and exceptional personalized care. The Adult Day Care offers isolated elders and those with mild care needs an opportunity to be in a social environment, have a great lunch and work on hobbies like art projects that they would not have the opportunity to do alone during the day.
FIVE OF THOUSANDS OF EXAMPLES:
A second-grader thought to have Attention Deficit Disorder was identified by School Nurse to be epileptic and is now linked with the local Epilepsy Association. A junior in high school need not have a parent come to the school each day to deliver the antibiotic needed to have with his lunch because a nurse is available on site. A young migrant family now has a medical history for their two children after visiting the monthly free clinic as well as the education needed to continue their good health. Millie, who has a mild case of dementia, is ready 20 minutes prior to the time the bus comes to pick her up from her daughter's home each day because she cannot wait to see her friends at the Adult Day Care Program. A group of residents from Health Central Park gather up kindergarten children on their laps and read them stories. One child says "'Grandma' no one has ever read to me before, would you read it again?"
