Clinic Launch Series: Part 4 of 5- Why a Public-Private Partnership?

In Haiti, over 80% of the population is living below the poverty line – that’s over 8 million people in need of economic opportunity, education, and human services. Social challenges of this magnitude cannot be tackled in isolation.Working together, the public and private sectors can catalyze development across the country. At C2C, we believe that the health sector is in desperate need of transformation and that a public-private partnership model has the power to give “new life” to flagging public health facilities. The Haitian Ministry of health agrees and has endorsed our work:

“C2C has demonstrated over many years that they hold the highest standards for quality and affordability. Their clinics are models of operational excellence and I believe that C2C’s operating model can transform public sector clinics across Haiti. C2C is a valued partner of the Haitian Ministry of Health,” said Dr. Ernst-Robert Jasmin, Director of the Northern Department, Haitian Ministry of Health

Step Four: Partner with the government to transform struggling public clinics and improve health outcomes for poor families

Starting with the Sinek clinic, our growing network of clinics will leverage the assets the Ministry of Health already has in place – infrastructure, trained personnel, and a commitment to data collection – by taking that system to the next level to fill the gaps that break down care delivery and undermine access and quality.

Our partnership with the Haitian Ministry of Health will double patient volume, ensure timely vaccination coverage for all children in the Sinek community, triple the pharmacy stock, and add diagnostics capacity on-site.

Rehabilitating the new clinic site at Sinek

Clinic Launch Series: Part 3 of 5- Meet the Staff of the Sinek Clinic

While a newly-renovated space, electronic medical records, and a stocked pharmacy are key components of a thriving community clinic, nothing is more important than the motivated and talented clinical staff who deliver care to patients each day. In our effort to rehabilitate government clinics, C2C will recruit, hire and train clinic personnel as needed. Fortunately, in Sinek, we inherit an extraordinary team of long-standing public employees who are excited about the management transformation that will give them the tools they need to deliver high-quality primary care.

Step Three: Staffing the clinic with talented, supported medical personnel

Meet Carmelle, the current Nurse Manager at the Sinek clinic. She has worked at the clinic for 11 years and has done everything in her power to care for patients. But the Ministry of Health as virtually no resources to support Carmelle in her efforts, so she has had to juggle competing demands: clinical care, inventory management, financial management, home-based care for tuberculosis patients, medical records and countless other functions. Carmelle is hopeful of change:

“For me, this partnership between C2C and the Ministry of Health can finally change things for the better in Sinek,” she says. “By coming together, we’ll build up the clinic to serve the local people with what they need. I’ve tried, but I need support. The arrival of C2C means that I won’t have worry about having supplies or medications for my patients. I won’t have to worry about leaving the clinic to go to town to find medicine to stock the shelves. C2C will make my life easier and I will have more time to give to my patients. I will get to do my job.”

Carmelle’s commitment to the clinic’s success and to the community of Sinek is evident. She shares her excitement for the community:“Finally, the people of Sinek will have access to health services. Usually, they have to travel to Limbé [the nearest town, 45 minutes away by car] for health services because the clinic here just isn’t able to take care of them. Now that C2C is here, the Sinek clinic will be able to take care of its own community.”

Clinic Launch Series: Part 2 of 5- Integrating Electronic Medical Records

As we prepare the new clinic for opening day, C2C is overhauling how patient data is captured and analyzed so that we can offer optimal patient care. Electronic medical records allow us to monitor all aspects of treatment efficacy, increase our ability to support good health over time, and ensure that the sickest and most vulnerable patients receive active follow-up.

Step Two: Investing in systems that support high-quality, long-term care for our patients.

C2C clinics offer the highest standard of patient care through our customized electronic medical record (EMR) system. Developed in collaboration with the Vecna Cares Charitable Trust, the EMR systems capture all aspects of patient clinical care, doctor-patient interaction, demographic data, diagnoses, prescriptions, and follow-up. Our tablet-based system fosters optimal patient flow at the clinic day-to-day, as patients travel from registration to consultation, to the laboratory and the pharmacy.

Very few medical facilities in Haiti have EMR systems, and we consider this capacity to be crucial to our success. Not only can we focus on each individual’s health trajectory, but we can monitor population health and coordinate effectively with the Haitian Ministry of Health. Our data is our enduring connection with our patients and is the backbone of responsive, patient-centered care.

At Sinek, you can see the “before” photo (below) shows how patient medical records used to be kept. The “after” photos show how our medical staff can quickly and easily capture patient data on tablets and focus, instead, on the patient-clinician interaction.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Stay tuned as we bring you more information next week about how the clinic is transforming. But first, a CALL TO ACTION! We would appreciate if you could take just a moment to do the following:

Follow us on social media:
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LinkedIn
Forward this email to a friend and ask them to follow C2C!

We want to build our community of supporters and advocates far and wide so that the community of Sinek and the new clinic know that we are following their success!

Clinic Launch Series: Part 1 of 5- Transforming the Pharmacy

Last week, we announced that C2C will officially open the doors of a new clinic in Sinek, northern Haiti, next month. This will be the 4th clinic in our growing network of community clinics. The community of nearly 20,000 lacks access to reliable, high-quality medical services. Despite the best efforts of the government to staff and equip a public clinic in Sinek, there simply isn’t enough public funding to pay salaries, secure the supply chain, or provide electricity or running water. C2C is proud to partner with the Haitian government to give the Sinek clinic a “new life” and to serve the community in perpetuity.

Step One: Guarantee a reliable supply chain for essential medicines.

Under government management, the Sinek clinic is able to stock only 6 to 8 different medicines and regularly experiences stock-outs because of failures up the supply chain. Under C2C’s model, the Sinek clinic will stock over 35 medicines. Reliability is a fundamental brand attribute of C2C clinics: we promise our patients that the medicine they need will always be in stock. We’ve developed an inventory and supply chain system that leverages efficiencies across the clinic network.

See our “before and after” photos below! The transformation of the Sinek pharmacy is well underway and we cannot wait to welcome our first patients to the revitalized public clinic in April.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Stay tuned as we bring you more information next week about how the clinic is transforming. But first, a CALL TO ACTION! We would appreciate if you could take just a moment to do the following:

Follow us on social media:
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Forward this email to a friend and ask them to follow C2C!

We want to build our community of supporters and advocates far and wide so that the community of Sinek and the new clinic know that we are following their success!

New C2C Clinic Site Opening in Haiti!

In just a few short weeks, C2C will officially open the doors of a new clinic in the community of Sinek, in northern Haiti. This is the 4th clinic in C2C’s growing network and we are working hard to ensure that it will meet the health needs of local families. This clinic isn’t starting from scratch; we’re working in partnership with Haiti’s government to rehabilitate flagging public clinics and give them a “new life” of operational excellence and health impact.

In a special 5-part email series leading up to the opening, we will feature the Sinek clinic to bring you information about how the clinic is transforming, how the extraordinary clinical staff are preparing to re-open to patients, and how we have strengthened the supply chain and expanded home-based services.

Join us as the clinic gets ready for opening day. But first, a CALL TO ACTION! We would appreciate if you could take just a moment to do the following:

Follow us on social media:
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Share this with a friend and ask them to follow C2C!

We want to build our community of supporters and advocates far and wide so that the community of Sinek and the new clinic know that we are following their success!

Our 2017 Annual Report is Here!

We are excited to share C2C’s 2017 Annual Report with you. The report highlights key achievements from the past year, including our new partnership with Haiti’s Ministry of Health, our expanding clinic network, and the growing scope of our services to poor and low-income communities in Haiti.

The year ahead is ambitious: we’ll double the size of our service delivery footprint in Haiti and we’re expanding our community health focus to ensure positive clinical outcomes for our patients. We value your comments, questions, and input about our work, and welcome you to contact us with feedback!

We would be grateful if you would share this Annual Report with friends and please follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook.

C2C brings prenatal care to expectant mothers at home

In addition to primary care, C2C has been delivering life-saving medical care to pregnant women in Haiti for over seven years. The statistics are shocking: Haiti has the highest maternal rate in the western hemisphere. 1 in 285 births will result in a woman’s death, while less than 50% of deliveries are attended by a skilled birth attendant. In rural Haiti, medical care is not accessible by the general population and women often receive no prenatal care leading up to delivery. If a problem occurs during pregnancy or delivery, mother and baby often die during labor as a result of no medical attention.

We have treated thousands of expectant women at our clinics, but the truth is: medical care alone is not enough. To ensure that women and their newborns have the care they need, we’ve developed a transformational model to attack the maternal and infant mortality crisis in Haiti by focusing on behavior change. This proposed model scaffolds women and families to access high-quality care and addresses demand-side barriers to care-seeking, a neglected area of study. We came up with a unique and powerful approach by paring our clinical care with social support for vulnerable families at the household level, which entails visiting expectant mothers at their home during their pregnancy and after giving birth.

Our Maternal Health Agents (MHA) lead these visits and focus mostly on education and counseling. The MHAs cover many different topics that vary from danger signs during pregnancy, safe birth options, nutrition, breastfeeding, and the importance of immunizations. They also keep an eye out for different symptoms that could indicate problems in the pregnancy by checking blood pressure and temperature.

Recently, one of our MHAs visited Shedeline, who is 19 years old and pregnant for the first time. Shedeline lives in a remote mountain area, far from C2C’s clinic in Acul du Nord. During the home visit, she has the opportunity to ask a lot of questions which helped her feel less nervous about pregnancy and more prepared to give birth.

MHA conducts a home visit with Shedeline, who is the first trimester of her first pregnancy

Home visits are guided by a tablet-based survey to capture data on patient responses and guide the quality of the interaction between mother and MHA

Thanks to our partners Vitamin Angels, all the pregnant and lactating women that visit our clinics receive prenatal vitamins that will help them prevent anemia during pregnancy and make sure their baby gets the nutrients that are essential for healthy development.

Our journey with Shedeline doesn’t end here. We will be checking in with her frequently through phone calls and home-visits prior to and after delivery to encourage adherence to the birth plan established during the first visit.

This 18-month program, funded by Grand Challenges Canada, innovates a model for ‘wraparound’ maternal and newborn care, offering a complete protocol of antenatal care, home-based and group-based education, robust postpartum care, as well as newborn care, including vaccinations, through baby’s first year. Our goal is to enroll at least 1,000 women and to meticulously track health outcomes to understand if and how the home-based behavior change intervention improves key metrics such as a complete prenatal regimen, breastfeeding adherence, pediatric care-seeking, infant nutrition and growth.

C2C selected as Henry Schein Cares Medalist

We’re excited to announce that C2C has been selected as a finalist for the Henry Schein Cares Medal for excellence in expanding access to health care for the underserved!

The Henry Schein Cares Medal is an initiative of Henry Schein Cares, the company’s global corporate social responsibility program. The award is given to nonprofit organizations from the fields of oral health, animal health, and medicine that demonstrate excellence by helping to increase access to care in underserved communities around the world.

“Throughout our company’s history, we at Henry Schein have been guided by the principle that everyone, regardless of their economic standing or personal circumstances, deserves quality health care,” said Stanley M. Bergman, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Henry Schein.

C2C shares Henry Schein’s commitment to serving communities in need and we honored to be recognized for the work we do in bringing low-cost, high-quality healthcare to the people of Haiti.

Learn more about the Henry Schein Cares Medal:

An Exciting Start to 2018!

I am very excited to wish you a Happy New Year and to introduce myself to the C2C community of friends and supporters.

My name is Dr. Samuel Bernard and I recently joined the C2C team last month as the Chief Operating Officer. I completed my medical degree at the Faculté de Médecine et de Pharmacie at the State University of Haiti in 2009 and have completed additional health management studies at Montreal University. Most recently, I served as the Medical Director of the St. Boniface Foundation in southern Haiti.

I am thrilled to join the C2C team in Cap Haitien at this exciting time of growth and expansion. In 2018, we will open 3 new clinics in partnership with the Haitian Ministry of Health, doubling the size of the C2C network in the northern region. Both personally and professionally, I am a believer in C2C’s bold approach: providing the highest quality medical care at affordable prices.

In my country, we need to address urgent health financing challenges. Free care for every citizen, forever, just isn’t feasible and isn’t building the long-term economy. C2C’s is a different approach, we know that. But isn’t it exciting to think: What if a community clinic were a financially sustainable endeavor, delivering medical care today and in perpetuity? What if it didn’t have to rely on aid funding year after year? What if we built a solid economic foundation for the healthcare system in Haiti, rather than patching the holes?

As a physician, originally from Cap Haitien, I am passionate about returning to my home region to make a contribution to improving the health and wellness of people in northern Haiti. Over the past month, I’ve been rolling up my sleeves to get to know the communities we serve, family by family.

I am energized about what this year holds for C2C and invite you to join me in anticipating the achievements you will see us reach as the year unfolds!

Yours truly,

Dr. Samuel Bernard
Chief Operating Officer, C2C

Make a Difference This Holiday Season: Gift a Life

This holiday season, we are launching a new campaign to support the life-saving medical care we deliver to pregnant women and their babies in Haiti. It was our founding vision and motivation to ensure that poor women have access to the health services they need to have healthy pregnancies and thriving babies.

The Gift a Life campaign will support over 1,200 women through the journey of safe pregnancy and provide them with: a complete protocol of prenatal care, home-based and group-based education, robust postpartum care, and newborn care (including vaccinations) through baby’s first year.

How can you help?

You can donate to this campaign directly to give mothers and babies a healthy start in life.

Share this campaign with a friend, family member or colleague, and introduce them to this life-saving program.

Your support will make a real, lasting impact in the lives of so many vulnerable families. We look forward to sharing stories of health and success of the program as mothers and babies thrive in 2018.