Helping Hands Health and Wellness Center

The mission of the Helping Hands Health and Wellness Center (hhhwc) is to be the caring Hands of jesus to provide medical care, Health education, counseling and social services to those with needs. Hhhwc is a faith-based free medical clinic that provides family medicine and social services care to medically uninsured and underinsured adults whose income is at or below 400 percent of the federal poverty guidelines. In 2023, the clinic saw a variety of changes, from the staff changes of hiring of a new operations manager and the creation of a dual role of pharmacist and grant writer/manager to the service changes of new offerings like fit kits and flu shots. The clinic's hybrid patient care model continues to be the foundational model of care, and the clinic exceeded expectations in 2023, serving 724 patients with 1,036 patient visits. Overall, hhhwc provided a total of 3,209 services to its patients. The clinic's team of staff members, board members, volunteers, supporters, and patients remain focused on improving clinic operations in order to make the clinic's processes as patient-focused as possible. Hhhwc serves patients who are medically underserved and lacking access to affordable care. In 2023, 89% of the clinic's patients were uninsured and 11% were underinsured. These insurance status percentages are the same as what the clinic saw in 2021 and 2022. In addition, hhhwc saw a total of 724 patients, with 466 patients being first-time patients. Most patients find out about the clinic through word of mouth. As in previous years, the clinic's patients are primarily female; 63% of the clinic's patients identify as women and 37% identify as men. Looking at the ages of hhhwc's patient population, 14% of clinic visits were patients between the ages of 18 and 29, 20% were patients between 30 and 39, 23% were patients between the 40 and 49, 20% were patients between 50 and 59, 10% were patients between 60 and 64, and 13% were patients over the age of 65. No one age group seems to need more services than the others; patients of all ages need access to medical care. Comparing these 2023 age figures to those in 2022, there does not seem to be a significant change in any particular age range. Hhhwc does not put geographic limits on who it serves and offer care to any and all undertreated adult patients. The greatest numbers of patients come from columbus and franklin county. However, the clinic treated patients from 22 zip codes outside of franklin county in 2023. During clinic visits in 2023, 73% of patients identified themselves as black, 6% as asian, 11% as white, and 10% as other or not identified. These percentages do not appear to significantly differ for the reported numbers in 2022. Historically, the clinic has served a primarily minority population. Because of the diversity of the clinic's patient population, it is also important to look at the primary languages of patients. With columbus and central Ohio becoming increasingly diverse, hhhwc utilizes martti to provide interpretation services for over 250 languages. This variety of languages is crucial to the clinic because 25% of patients in 2023 did not report english as their primary language. In 2023, the clinic saw a surge in the number of haitian-creole-speaking and fulani-speaking patients. To look at the individual impact of each of the clinic's programs, the free care program should be highlighted first. The free care program operates weekly on tuesdays and thursdays and provided 1,036 visits in 2023. While primary care is the primary service at hhhwc, the free care program also provided 286 mental Health and Wellness visits, 394 tb skin tests, 801 blood draws, and 124 specialty referrals. The women's Health program is the clinic's monthly program and it offers free pap tests, pelvic exams, and clinical breast exams on to the clinic's female patients on a monthly basis. The women's Health program was able to provide 156 services in 2023. The hhhwc team of volunteers, board members, donors, and supporters are what allowed the clinic's programs to be successful this year and are the team that continues to allow the clinic's programs to blossom year after year. Hhhwc's volunteers donated over 2,500 hours of services to the clinic in 2023. Included in this number are 30 licensed medical professionals contributing approximately 1,200 hours of service. The volunteer corps is what sustains the clinic. The area medical community also assists us with almost 10,000 of in-kind donations. The clinic's staff team is also pushed to provide more, to be more creative, and to serve with all of their talents. The staff team works hard to keep the clinic operating and to keep expanding programming to provide more in the community. The hhhwc team tries to keep supporters informed by communicating through its newsletters, social media pages, speaking engagements, mailings, and meetings.