For the past three weeks, a health care team in the mobile unit of Affinia Healthcare has been stationed at Normandy High School, to offer physicals, immunizations and other services so that area students up to age 18 will be ready for the first day of school on August 9.
“We basically go everywhere,” Anthony Floyd, driver/registration specialist for the mobile medical van, said. “We do anything from complete physicals, sports physicals, immunizations, vision screenings, hearing screenings, and we are working on asthma as well.”
The mobile unit is staffed by two registered nurses, a driver/registration specialist. It features two private exam rooms, a wheelchair lift and a registration area for up to three children.
“Transportation is a big problem with a lot of families – and sometimes, they have one car, sometimes they have no car – and often that’s the biggest barrier to services, and also, the wait,” said Pediatric Nurse Practitioner Kathleen Guerrein. “We’ve been able to the children scheduled … and we’ve been taking walk-ins.”
For students seen on the mobile unit or at Affinia’s school-based health center, Medicaid and commercial insurance are billed. Co-pays and other balances left after insurance has paid the claim may be collected at subsequent visits to its health center locations or billed to guardians, Affinia representatives told The American.
“Fees due from uninsured students seen on the mobile unit or in the school-based health center are waived,” she said. “Uninsured adults and other members of the community are assessed on the sliding-fee schedule with payment expected on the date of service.”
The mobile health unit’s last day will be Monday, August 7, from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m., with nurses available to give hearing and vision screenings and immunizations.
If vision, hearing or other screenings indicate additional follow-up care is needed, Affinia makes it available.
“We hook them up with Vision for Life for Children, and they will provide free glasses,” Guerrein said. “If they have hearing problems, sometimes it’s just wax and I have to educate families and we prescribe wax removal. If there’s a blood pressure problem, we try to partner up with a nurse to recheck the blood pressure.”
And this is the time of year that families are making sure immunizations are up-to-date so students can go to school. By the time students reach high school, certain booster immunizations are required.
“A lot of kids are in need of that when they go into ninth grade – they need their boosters really by eighth grade,” Guerrein said. “Tdap and Menactra, which is a meningococcal meningitis vaccine. And then there’s a booster to the meningitis at 16 years of age.”
The Tdap vaccine protects against three bacterial diseases that can be life-threatening, tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis (whooping cough).
In just a few weeks, Affinia will open a healthcare clinic at Normandy High School, with a ribbon-cutting ceremony scheduled for Thursday, August 31. The clinic will be located in its alternative building on the school property. This will provide less disruption to the regular school activities and greater access and privacy for students and community members seeking healthcare.
In addition to physicals, immunizations and vision and hearing screenings, the health center will offer comprehensive reproductive and behavioral health services.
The school-based health center at Normandy High School is a community initiative made possible by the support of Affinia, Wyman Center, the For the Sake of All project by Washington University St. Louis and BJC Healthcare.
Initially, the clinic will be open for all Normandy students. Sometime later in the 2017-2018 school year, the clinic will be available for the entire community, even for Normandy Schools Collaborative residents who don’t have children in its schools.
Affinia’s mobile medical unit partners with St. Louis Public Schools, charter schools, daycares and other locations as requested to provide medical services.
For more information, contact Anthony Floyd with Affinia at 314-814-8564.
