story_dayspring06

New Best Friends

Originally published in the Spring 2006 edition of Healing Waters

By Catherine Pearson

Helena Guo

Helena Guo wears a welcoming smile and carries contagious excitement. But these are not the reasons Siloam Family Health Center staff consider her their new best friend. Helena is Siloam’s new full time

Behavioral Health Consultant from Centerstone, the largest provider of behavioral health services in Middle Tennessee. A recent grant from the Baptist Healing Trust now supports the fulltime placement of a Centerstone counselor at Siloam.

Mental health care often carries a stigma of weakness and shame in American culture, as well as in over 100 cultures represented within Nashville ’s refugee and immigrant population. Siloam’s patients, 80 percent immigrant or refugee, often face such barriers in seeking out necessary mental and emotional health services.

Patients arrive at Siloam complaining of chronic pain, but a physical cause may not be found. Depression, anxiety, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, obesity and smoking cessation are some of the concerns now addressed by a team in a holistic approach to patient care. “It’s not just a counselor that we have on staff, but a new approach, a team.” Dr. Morgan Wills emphasized. The new approach includes behavioral and pastoral care, allowing Siloam to address the needs of the whole patient, body, mind and spirit.

“We’ve always known the tremendous emotional and behavioral needs in our patients,” Dr. Wills explained, noting how the behavioral health program has been a long time in the making. Three years ago, Siloam’s staff learned of the Behavioral Health Consultant (BHC) model of care at a Christian Community Health Fellowship Conference in Chicago . It seemed to fit with Siloam’s goal of providing care for refugees and immigrants, to share the love of Christ by serving those in need through health care. Just as importantly, it seemed practical and cost-effective in a nonprofit setting.

A slide from the recent BHC training session read, “The Behavioral Health Consultant will be your new best friend”. While the staff immediately began joking, “I hope my best friend is here today,” the truth of Helena ’s role ran much deeper. “Caring for the poor and sick entails entering into their suffering. At the end of the day, it can take its toll on the caregiver.” Dr. Wills explained. “The Behavioral Health Consultant becomes the primary care providers’ ‘best friend’ by augmenting the physician’s capacity and sharing the burden.”

Helena is not the only new best friend in this new model of health care. Helena is to behavioral health what Pastor Doug Mann is to spiritual health. Doug is one of several pastors volunteering at Siloam. “My job is to really bring a dimension of the presence of the Lord into every place where people are, staff offices and waiting area,” Doug excitedly described his role, “when I am called into a room with a patient, we don’t have time to teach or preach. We import the presence of the Lord.”

“The doctors and Doug are a very good team,” Helena approvingly assessed. Doug’s role can even be seen in the quantifiable change in patients’ emotional states. Upon arrival at the clinic, patients who recorded their stress and anxiety at the maximum “10” have written “0” before departing. After praying with Doug, patients’ exuberance and relief are palpable. “It’s not the doctors, not the people; it’s the Lord. This is a special place where his manifest love is.” Doug explained, taking no credit for himself, but sharing the excitement of this effective approach.

The program is anything but traditional. A paradigm shift from scheduled therapy sessions, this model addresses the client’s immediate needs, allowing focused intervention. Eliminating the stigma of mental health care, the patient never ceases to be a patient of the primary care physician, yet gains the benefit of behavioral and spiritual care as well. “One stop shopping” Helena describes this collaboration, a pioneer direction for the future of health care. “Medicine is not always the most effective intervention.” Helena explained, alternatively addressing physical symptoms through behaviors and lifestyles.

Nancy West, Siloam’s president, said that she believes this program is truly putting Siloam on the cutting edge of delivering health care that meets the needs of the whole person – body, mind and spirit.

Dr. Wills sees Siloam’s role as “helping patients take small but important steps.” In fact, he adds, “the model jives theologically with what we are doing here as well. Regardless of where they are on the faith spectrum, we assume that God is already at work somehow in the lives of our patients. Part of our role as holistic health care providers is to discern where that is. The BHC and the pastoral caregiver give us more tools to help them take the next step.”

“You can really get to the root cause of what’s going on,” Nicole Kenderzierski, Clinical Services Manager, expressed her excitement and relief about the arrangement, “It’s empowering for patients and the provider. With limited time and resources they can now address the needs that have gone unmet for so long.”

Excited about the present, Nancy continues to look to the future, “this kind of care has always been our goal and it is exciting to see some formality and structure evolve from all we have been learning. We realize that many volunteer counselors and pastors are eager to join us in this new and innovative program. Currently, because the program is still in the early stages, volunteer slots are limited. We look forward to the day that the behavioral and pastoral care components are as well established as our primary care program and we can add many additional volunteers to support the emotional and spiritual needs of our patients.”

Editor’s note: This article was contributed by Catherine Pearson, a Belmont University graduate. Catherine worships at Saint Bartholomew’s Episcopal and heard about Siloam at church. She is a gifted writer and volunteered to use her gifts to help at Siloam. Catherine’s international travel and living abroad have deepened her compassion for refugees and immigrants here in the US . We are grateful for her participation.