Deaconess Faith Community Nurse Ministries

Annual Report 2014

Mission

To improve and promote the health of body, mind, spirit

and community throughout the St. Louis region.

 

Program Accomplishments

In 2014, Deaconess Parish Nurse Ministries, LLC of Deaconess Foundation became Deaconess Faith Community Nurse Ministries, an independent 501 c 3, focused on the vision of creating communities of wholistic wellness through exceptional faith community nursing across the Greater St. Louis region. As the year unfolded, Deaconess Faith Community Nurse Ministries worked to address the needs of the community by developing four distinct programs, Senior Heath, Community Outreach, Care Transitions and Congregational, each with pertinent objectives which could be measured through evidence based assessments and diagnostic tools. Program effectiveness is being tracked through a newly designed computer documentation program that is being implemented in 2015 with 2014 baseline data. In 2014, Deaconess Faith Community Nurse Ministries has served 3385 clients through these four programs. These clients come from St. Louis City and County, St. Charles and Jefferson Counties in Missouri, St. Clair and Madison Counties in Illinois. Our services are provided in houses of worship, food pantries, day care centers, and community centers that are serving “high risk” populations, as well as, in individual homes.

 

Senior Health Program provides nurse home visits and group classes to assist adults age 60 and older in managing chronic medical conditions. Our program goals include reducing preventable ER visits and hospitalizations; improving self- management of prescription medications; improving Chronic Disease Management and decreasing falls.  In 2014, this program saw 698 clients, with 236 clients in the program participated in 140 group classes held in each site.  1747 individual home visits were completed by the nurses who serve at Cape Albeon in Fenton, Villa Teresa – Sisters of the Most Precious Blood  in O’Fallon, MO, SAJE Ministry in Crestwood and North City Collaborative in zip codes 63113, 63121 and 63107.

 

Community Outreach Program provides a nurse in the community based sites such as food pantries community centers and day care centers that serve low income families. Our program removes barriers to health care for vulnerable populations by providing health screenings and education at existing resource centers that serve the neighborhood such as Trinity Episcopal on Euclid Ave. and Ascension Episcopal on Lucas and Hunt Food Pantries and Kindercottage Day Care center in East St Louis. In this program, 651 clients were seen. The nurses made 1302 individual visits and had 5117 clients in group classes.

 

Care Transitions provides a nurse in the community doing home visits that assists the person with chronic medical conditions in transitioning from dependency on hospital and emergency room acute care to self-care at home. This program is open to low income adults, 200% of poverty or below, ages 18 through 65 that are part of the Mercy Health system. The goals of the program are to reduce preventable non-emergent ER and hospitalizations, improve proper prescription medications, increase the quality of life through disease management and lifestyle education and improve the coordination of medical care through the use of personal health record. In this program, since August 2014, we received 15 referrals, seeing 9 clients (6 clients refused services) in 33 visits with 33.3% are over the age of 59 years of age. 8 of 9 clients have not returned to the emergency room since the nurse has seen them. 7 of the clients are able now able to return demonstrate knowledge of their medications and chronic disease management. 7 of the clients have received appropriate social service referrals which allowed for them to remain safely in their homes.

 

Congregational Faith Community Nurse Program places a highly educated registered nurse in faith communities in the Greater St. Louis region. Each congregation designs a unique program for their nurse. The overall aim of each nurse is to use their medical expertise and mental and spiritual wellness training to improve the mental, physical and spiritual health of individuals and their communities. In this program, there are 9 registered nurses, serving in 3 UCC, 4 Roman Catholic, and 1 ECLA Lutheran congregations in the Greater St. Louis Metropolitan region. These nurses saw 2027 clients in 2789 individual visits and 49 group classes. 26.3% of the clients are over the age of 59.

 

Two of the UCC congregational nurses, in addition to serving their respective congregations, serve in the Salam Free Medical clinic, a walk-in medical clinic, provided by the Muslim Physician group and St. Peters Evangelical UCC in Ferguson. The clinic is open two hours every Saturday, providing free medical services to clients in the Ferguson and North County area. The faith community nurses provide initial assessments, education and case management to the clinic clients. In 2014, the clinic saw 258 clients in 39 days of service, providing needed therapy services to 29 clients.

 

                    Board of Directors for 2014:                         

                                                               Rev. Daniel Handschy, Board Chair

                                                               Rev. Marc Smith, Vice Chair

                                                               Dr. Jade James, Treasurer

                                                               Mr. Darius Miller, Esq., Secretary

 

                                  Rev. Richard Ellerbrake                                    Ms. Jackie Hamilton

                                  Ms. Mary Calcaterra                                           Sister Kathleen Buchheit

                                  Ms. Kate Beatty                                                   Ms. Jeanie Frazee

                                  Ms. Sue Leon                                                        Mr. John O’Shaughnessy

 

 Financial Information

(Year ending 12/31/14)

Finance chart 

 

Expenses

 

Rev. Donna Smith-Pupillo, RN

Executive Director

Office: 314-918-2596

483 East Lockwood Ave. Suite 106

St. Louis, MO 63119