For our staff, making a meaningful difference both inside and outside of PAH isn’t a New Year’s resolution or a one-time act of service; it’s part of who we are. Nowhere is this commitment to improving the lives and health of our patients and their communities clearer than in the projects championed by our Penn Medicine CAREs grant recipients.
For the past year at PAH’s Hall-Mercer Community Behavioral Health Center, Sheau-Ling Duh, a case manager for the Southeast Asian Blended Case Management Program, and a board-certified dance/movement therapist, has been leading a creative dance group for Southeast Asian immigrants with a range of mental illnesses and developmental disabilities. These underserved patients often struggle to integrate with their communities and to connect with their care teams, and these challenges are only further compounded by a lack of fluency in English.
That’s where the nonverbal self-expression of dance comes in.
Every week, patients flock to Duh’s group to spend an hour dancing, stretching, and building their social and language skills together in a safe, supportive space. The program combines therapy and exercise to help patients develop the tools to engage with each other and maintain a more independent level of functioning in their communities. Duh and fellow case managers Linh Luong and Trang Le also mix instruction in Mandarin and Cantonese with English to help patients build language fluency. With the funding of her CAREs grant, Duh plans to bring in more music equipment and to introduce more musical varieties to support the program’s growth.
“Dancing encourages cooperation,engagement, and stress reduction through movement, so patients are able to improve their health and wellness both physically and mentally,” Duh said. “I’m so thankful for all the support that this program has received as we bring joy to these patients’ lives.”
Across the street in the Emergency Department, clinical nurse
Kim Milano, RN, has also been working hard to ensure that our patients receive more than medical care. For five years, Milano and her colleagues have distributed winter boots to homeless patients to combat the skin breakdown, swelling, and foot ulcers they saw limping through the ED doors. After all, worn-out or non-existent footwear is no match for freezing temperatures, snow, and ice melt.
“Many of our homeless patients were coming in with blisters and foot pain due to wet feet and socks,” Milano said. “They were lacking solid, comfortable footwear, so providing them with waterproof boots seemed like the obvious preventative measure.”
With her grant, Milano was able to purchase 25 pairs of boots in a range of sizes. Some of their regular homeless patients submitted requests for the boots early in the season as the temperatures began to drop, but anyone who arrives at PAH with inadequate footwear is welcome to a pair.The ED team works hard to ensure everyone receives their size, but if the need does not match with the supply, staff are encouraged to call Milano so she can try to obtain the correct size. Milano hopes that they will be able to expand the program to coats, hats, gloves, and boots in the future to ensure that patients leave PAH as warm, dry, and protected from the winter elements as possible.
“This is truly a group effort, and I could never have done it without the support of Lisa [Triantos, MSN, RN, CEN, NE-BC, nurse manager] and Lauren [Ellis, RN, assistant nurse manager] and the ED staff,” Milano said. “It’s hard discharging patients to shelters or to the streets, and we want to do everything we can to help.”
Feeling inspired? You too can make a difference in your local community! Whether you’re already actively volunteering with a local organization, or you have an idea for a new community outreach initiative, Penn Medicine CAREs grant funding is available for projects big and small that address unmet community health and wellness needs. The deadline for the next round of funding is Thursday, March 1, so be sure to visit http://uphsxnet.uphs.upenn.edu/community/ to submit your proposal.