After years of planning, the new Community Health Connection clinic is slowly becoming reality.
In August 2008, ground was broken on a North Tulsa clinic that would serve as a medical home to a traditionally underserved population. The new clinic had been a dream of Laurie Paul’s ever since opening Community Health Connection a few years earlier.
“When I was a registered nurse, I was working in the emergency room and really had an epiphany. I thought, ‘If we took care of these people, we wouldn’t have a full emergency room,’” said Paul, executive director for Community Health Connection, a federally qualified health center located at 9912 E. 21st St. “We see everyone that walks in the door. Our goal is to collaborate with all the hospitals to try to decrease the use of our emergency rooms for primary care.”
Paul had been overseeing an aggressive grant-writing campaign, and it appeared her vision for a new facility would finally become reality as the first mound of dirt was overturned during the ceremony at the clinic’s future home at Fourth Street and Lewis Avenue.
“But then the economy took a turn for the worse,” said Paul.
Community Health Connection provides such services as prenatal care, immunizations, lab work, case management, mental health and counseling, to name a few. Since opening its doors in the mid-1990s, the clinic has seen an explosion in its patient base, meaning more room is needed. That’s why Paul aggressively sought funding to open a new clinic.
Not to be discouraged by a funding shortfall that put the project on hold, Paul moved forward on submitting a competitive grant. Much to her discouragement, this grant also came up short, once again be putting the new clinic on hold.
In August of last year, however, Paul received two e-mails she never expected to see. The first asked if Community Health Connection was still a viable entity. If so, the e-mail inquired, how much would the entity need to move forward with its expansion efforts?
With the passage of the health-care bill, the e-mail explained, her group might be eligible for funds to move their project forward. The past several years had been an emotional roller-coaster for Paul, so she tried not to get her hopes too high.
Until she received the second e-mail stating the group would receive $4.6 million in federal monies to make the dream a reality. As a result, the past several months have been a whirlwind of activity, rebidding everything from the architectural work to materials to construction companies.
The new 16,000-square-foot clinic is scheduled to open its doors this fall.
“In the meantime we have done major renovations at our existing clinic and will stay here as well to serve the needs of our East Tulsa residents,” said Paul. “Over the next year we want to focus on nutrition, immunizations for everyone, preventing and testing for such things as diabetes.”
They also will be submitting a twin grant with Morton Comprehensive Health Services to get new school-based clinics.
“Step by step we have to give more and more health care to those people who haven’t had it in the past in an effort to make their quality of life better.”
