Public can use medical clinics at 2 high schools
Residents of Boynton Beach and Delray Beach who need medical assistance soon will be able to visit an unlikely site for care: a local high school.
Boynton Beach High and Atlantic High in Del ray Beach are about to become home to clinics sponsored by Genesis CommunityHealth, which operates several Palm Beach County medical clinics for the needy.
Early next year, Genesis will open the clinics to students, and will expand their services to adults shortly afterward, said Eddie Ruiz, Palm Beach County schools assistant superintendent.
“We are creating a template for howthis canwork at a lot of different schools,” Ruiz said. “We hope one day this will spread throughout the county.”
Theclinics, whichare free to students, are scheduled to be open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. whenschool is in session. They will be closed onweekends and when school is closed for summer and other breaks, according to the contract with the school district.
The clinics will bill Medicaid, Medicare and private insurance if adult patients are covered, and charge a sliding fee for the uninsured.
“No patient will ever be turned away,” said Dr. Johanna Albrecht, a Genesis pediatrician.
Every Palm Beach County public school has a nurse, supplied by the county’s health care district. The Genesis clinics will provide a second layer
of care, with a nurse practitioner who can diagnose conditions and prescribe medicine, and a social worker on site to assist students and their families with issues related to mental health and poverty.
The concept has been tried before but did not continue because of funding problems or overlapping nearby services, health officials said.
Broward does not have any schools with community clinics.
In Miami-Dade, the Jessie Trice Community Health Centers operate40 school-based medical clinics as well as dental and primary care clinics for the uninsured.
In 2016, the centers opened their newest clinic at Miami Northwestern Senior High, open daily to the public after school hours and on Saturdays.
Genesis executive director DeAnna Warren said Boynton Beach and Atlantic were selected for their high numbers of students who receive freeand reduced-price lunches, an indicator of poverty. At each school, students will first visit the school nurse, who will decide whether they need additional care.
“It will be just like what you getwhenyou go to the pediatrician’s office,” said Albrecht. “Vaccines, sports physicals, they will have it right there at school.”
The school district will spend up to $50,000 to renovate a classroom to fit the Boynton Beach High clinic; Atlantic High has space that’s almost ready to accept the Genesis staff, Ruiz said.