NPC partners with CHI on campus health clinic
With a goal of making health care more easily accessible for students and staff, National Park College has partnered with Catholic Health Initiatives Hot Springs to bring a health care clinic to campus.
The new clinic, housed in the lower level of the Liberal Arts building, is open on Mondays from 1-4:30 p.m. and on Thursdays from 8 a.m. to noon. According to a news release, no appointments are needed, all major insurances are accepted, and those who self-pay will receive significant discounts.
The CHI St. Vincent primary nurse practitioner for the clinic, Lacy Holley, said it is not only available for students, faculty and staff, but also for the community. She noted that it will offer such services as general illness/injury visits, women’s wellness visits, physicals, sexually transmitted disease screenings, and flu and COVID-19 testing.
After officially opening on Feb. 13, the college hosted an open house and tour of the clinic last Wednesday.
“The creation of this clinic is a game-changer for our students,” said John Tucker, NPC dean of students. “It’s going to provide weekly access to health care for our resident students. We have approximately 200 students every semester living on our campus, so this will provide a nextdoor option for their health care needs.”
Tucker said they began really seeing a need for the clinic upon completing the school’s first residence hall in 2020, as there were students who had no transportation but needed access to health care.
“The partnership with CHI was just natural. We knew
that CHI partnered with school districts in the area, so it made sense to us that we could partner with CHI St. Vincent,” he said.
CHI St. Vincent Hot Springs President Dr. Doug Ross said that over the last few years, the hospital has placed an emphasis on meeting those needs at schools. NPC, he noted, is one of five schools in the community for which it has a clinic.
“A lot of times families just get really, really busy with the pace of life, and they lose track of getting their kids into the doctor,” he said.
“I’m guilty of that with my family at times. But on the other side of it — and this is something that really resonated with me as part of our mission for caring for this community but, specifically, focusing on vulnerable groups of individuals in our community — many of the kids were not getting into their provider because of a lack of resources,” he said.
“Either parents couldn’t get off work, families didn’t have transportation, and really, that was a big problem. So our solution was just, ‘OK, if kids can’t get to the doctor, let’s bring our providers to them.’”
Miki Smith, campus nurse at NPC, said that before the clinic opened, she had to find walk-in clinics that were close by for the students, and find a way to get them there.
“Now they can just walk across the parking lot and be seen immediately,” she said. “And the faster we can get them treatment, the faster they can get back in class.”
Ross said CHI’s focus on local public schools “just grew phenomenally.” The Lakeside, Hot Springs and Jessieville school districts also partner with CHI, while the Fountain Lake and Lake Hamilton school districts partner with Health Star Physicians of Hot Springs.
“What we’ve been blown away with is not just the students, but how many of the faculty actually utilize the services,” he said.
“We have been very, very intentional at CHI St. Vincent of building our relationship with National Park College. … We very much want to see National Park continue to grow and be successful. As the largest employer in town, we have a selfish interest in that growth as well. But outside of just numbers, I really found that National Park graduates that we’ve been able to hire are exceptionally well trained and really, really have a compassionate heart, which is part of our core values at CHI St. Vincent.”
NPC President John Hogan said the COVID-19 pandemic amplified the need for additional health care amenities on campus, and that many of the students do not have access to health care.
“It moves the needle incrementally and in every other way,” he said. ” … Some of our students will be navigating their own health care for the first time. I appreciate that they will be able to utilize the caring expertise of CHI staff when making decisions about their health.”