One of the most frightening symptoms of the during this covid pandemic was to watch patients not able to breathe. The state scrambled to find respirators or "jerry rig" what machinery they could find.

But it was terrifying to think that you would not be able to take another breath, something that we do every few seconds normally without even thinking about it.

Our guests are from The Breathing Association. Alicia Hopkins, who is a nurse practitioner and director of the Lung Health Services, and Collette Harrell, who is the director of the HEAP and Social Services Programs for The Breathing Association.

The Breathing Association has a rich history here in Central Ohio. We hear a detailed overview of how the agency began.

The Breathing Association began in 1906 with the onset of Tuberculosis, but it seems that The Breathing Association have filled a void in our community long since TB was “controlled”. The association wants to ensure we can all breathe easier.

The Breathing Association strives to educate the public on the issues affecting our community, such as smoking, air quality, energy needs, diseases like COPD, asthma, and other breathing disorders. The agency is rich in educational resources and services. Alisha gives us more detail about the “Lung Health Services” she manages.

Home Energy Assistance Program (HEAP) is a federally funded program that provides eligible Ohioans assistance with their home energy bills. Colette directs HEAP and other social services. She gives us an overview of HEAP, other programs and how residents can utilize the services.

The agency is very active not only in educating the public and potential clients, but also educating decision-makers, government officials and others regarding air quality and environmental factors. Alicia talks about what is being addressed right now at the state government level, and how the association works with our representatives.

One other issue which has been prevalent in our community for decades is smoking. Ohio has continued to rate at unhealthy levels compared to the rest of the country – we do not seem to be able to “stop cold turkey”! The Breathing Association can help with their Quit For Good cessation Program and tips on how to quit.

We would love to hear from you.

Email us at hello@lookingforwardourway.com.

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And of course everything can be found on our website, Looking Forward Our Way.

Recorded in Studio C at 511 Studios. A production of Circle270Media Podcast Consultants.

We are looking forward our way from Studio

C in the 511 Studios located in the Brewery District in downtown Columbus.

This is Brett and with me, as always, is Carol.

We have a wonderful podcast today in our Healthy Living Track.

And we're hoping that our listeners are

ready to hear some great information from our guests today.

You know, one of the most frightening

symptoms of the during this covid pandemic was to watch patients not able to breathe.

The state scrambled to find respirators or jerry rig what machinery they could find.

But it was terrifying to think that you would not be able to take another breath,

something that we do every few seconds normally without even thinking about it.

So today, our guests, please welcome from

the Breathing Association, Alicia Hopkins, who is a nurse practitioner and director

of the Lung Health Services, and Collette Harrell, who is the director of the HEAP

and Social Services Programs for the Breathing Association.

Thank you both so much for joining us today.

Thank you for having us.

Yeah, I'm guessing that a quite a few

people in our audience probably have not heard of the Breathing Breathing

Association or maybe don't really know what the Breathing Association does.

Let's put it that way and talk about a

rich history that we have here in central Ohio with that organization.

Could you give us an overview of how the

agency began, which I think was due to another pandemic as well?

No.

Is a little bit earlier than the pandemic that you're thinking, OK.

Carrie Nelson Black.

She started the organization in 1996.

And of course, the name has changed over

the past century, but it stayed the same it.

So she what she did is she saw that there was this huge need and she called it the

sick poor and where TB actually killed one in nine persons.

And actually her sister had died from tuberculosis at age 20.

So we think that that kind of geared her

towards this, wanting to treat the sick poor.

And so she'd gone to Boston, New York

and Chicago just on her own to see how she could help care for the sick poor.

And she brought back a nurse with her and started the breathing association,

which was called at that time, the Columbus Tuberculosis Society in 1986.

And then it kind of has grown from there

and from her other organizations that branched off from us.

And, you know, we think that tuberculosis is gone.

But it's really not. It is not.

It is. I remember being exposed to someone and it

was probably in the late 80s, early 90s and having to go get tested.

So it's still an issue.

And when folks start questioning what we're doing with today's pandemic, you sit

back and you're like, yeah, it's not going anyplace.

You know, it's not the largest concern in the U.S. anymore.

However, there's there was

about 9000 cases in the U.S. last year, approximately.

So, I mean, it's not this it's not as

large as it used to be, but it's still present.

It's still it's still an issue that we had to go on.

It's not gone. It's not gone.

It's still here. Just not as rampant it used to be.

And I think one of the things that we

sometimes forget is that even though the Breathing Association is a health agency,

our social services department plays a large role in people getting Weill.

And our HEAP program, which is the Home

Energy Assistance Program, is the only heat medical model in the state of Ohio.

And we created that model because we

understood what Carey Nelson Black understood years ago when she took milk

and eggs to to the homes of people who were not being able.

Not only were they ill, they couldn't work.

So economically, they became more and more disadvantaged.

And so how do we get you?

Well, if you don't have income, how do we get you?

Well, if you're going home to a cold house, if you're going home to an

overheated house, so wanted to bring up the refrigerator or empty refrigerator.

Right.

And so how do we make these things more palatable?

And how do we look at the parallel between

what the clinic does and what we do as the heat medical model, which is providing

assistance for people to pay their utilities?

Because, again, looking at breathing, if you're too hot or too cold or you have

certain diagnosis, they're exacerbated by extreme cold or heat.

Right. So we want to make sure that we're there

providing those services that keeps them well in the winter and cool in the summer.

Well, let's go back to looking at the mission and the and the vision of the

breathing association. Think about how important it's not just a breath, right?

It's not.

So our vision is better breathing for better lives.

And that doesn't just incorporate your medications, but it incorporates we have

this holistic view, like Collette was saying with your heating and cooling.

And we really look at when we go to your homes, they look at.

Your homes, I mean, look at how you

breathe, how well your windows are sealed, how well your home is cooled or not,

and then our mission is to help people breathe easier, one person at a time

through education, detection, care and treatment.

And again, it's not just medication, right, that you are most concerned with.

It's how the person functions in their home as a whole.

There have been homes that I've gone into and I see, you know, an elderly woman who

is heating her home with a gas stove, with the burners going on in the oven, open up.

And then when you refer them to the heat

department are and the services that they provided or vice versa, you really see

it's more of a holistic view than just your medication, right?

She's absolutely right.

I mean, we they go into the home,

our case managers go into the home, and many times we become gatekeepers for some

of the elderly and some of the other homes that we go into.

We might have been the only person in their home in the last year.

And we have we have provided linkage to the senior senior care options.

We have provided linkages to other

nonprofits that provide services in the home, as well as providing what we do.

And so it's very, very important.

All of our case managers, even though we're doing the Home Energy Assistance

Program, we're still CPR certified, we're still first a certified.

And we want to make sure that when we get in that home that we're able to assist.

We're also able to link them back to our clinic or even our mobile health van that

is coming in the community that they may be close to.

And then they can begin to feel

comfortable going to people that they know are there for their better health.

Like she said, better breathing for better lives.

We try to make sure that that's from the beginning of the walk through our door to

when we say job well done, you you're looking much better.

You're breathing much better. Sure.

Exactly.

Well, you know, our goal is to provide our audience with needed resources, hopefully

make it a couple of clicks away once they hear the episode.

The Breathing Association strives to

educate the public on issues affecting our community, such as smoking, air quality

energy needs, diseases like COPD, asthma and other breathing disorders.

I mean, we're talking about breathing here.

Can you give us some more details on the agency's educational resources and how

our listeners can utilize the services at least?

Let's start with that lung health services that you manage.

So with educating our patients, really, I think education is the key.

So with our patients that when we see

them, we really are educating them on how do you take your medication?

When do you take your medication?

So when I ask them, how do you take your

medication or what do you take it, I wait for the answer.

And then you do take your medicine twice a day.

Right? Right.

So but it goes a little bit further than that.

So if a person has

they have a little more trouble understanding the medications or inhalers.

I'll send a respiratory therapist to their

home or will send a medical assistant to their home and just

double clarify, double check and education.

We do our best with trying to go out into the community as well.

So we are.

We are associated with the charitable

health care network and with the National Association of Free

Clinics, and so what they do is they help us represent they represent us and other

free clinics in Columbus and Ohio and nationally.

And we'll take that to our legislators and

we'll help educate our legislators as well so that we can have additional funding so

that we can help educate our patients and our people in the community.

So, Collette,

you've talked about heat, but our our listeners may not know what that is.

So let's give them sort of an overview of what what does that H.E.A.P. stand for

and and who uses that program and how they can use it?

Absolutely.

The Home Energy Assistance Program provides utility assistance.

To low income or economically challenged

households that are 175 percent or below of the poverty level.

So we work with seniors, veterans, those who are on fixed incomes.

We have a lot of people who are getting

Social Security, supplemental insurance, income.

We have people who are receiving medical benefits.

We have people that are receiving living in low income housing.

And then we have some people who are working every day doing all they can to

support their families, but not just having enough to make ends meet.

There are a lot of working people, husband

and wife in the household working hard, but maybe they have four children and

they're only making thirteen, 14 dollars an hour.

And it's not enough to do what they need to do when they come to us.

We want to assist them

in providing that gas bill payment, that electric bill payment.

We also have the when a crisis program

that runs from November to March of each year.

And we assist people in various ways in that one.

First of all, if they have a disconnect,

notice, if they're shut off, if they're in crisis, if they need to transfer so they

can move to another household, if they're having fuel, fine.

Maybe they live in a trailer and they need propane.

We allow them if they're under 25 percent

of fuel, they can come in and that gives assistance for that.

This year, we actually helped up to nine hundred and fifty dollars.

Wow.

So and believe it or not, we still have very few, but still have some people

getting wood and coal for heating, for heating.

And so it's our goal not to have anyone for Alicia went into the household and the

person was heating their home for the with their oven.

That's our goal for that not to happen, to

not have those fire hazards when it's in the winter.

And I see the news and there's been a fire in a home, my heart stops and I always

hope it wasn't because they were trying to heat their home and and didn't know about

us, didn't reach out to us, didn't get assistance that we could have given them.

And so we do really, really hard work,

really hard to provide that service in the winter.

We also will help fix the furnace, because what happens when you have

utilities but the appliances don't work, your furnace is broke.

That can run deep for people.

So up to five hundred dollars will assist

in getting your furnace repaired in the summer.

We have the summer crisis program that summer where I believe winter is

economically driven is about whether or not you're disconnected, whether or not

you're shut off, whether or not you don't have enough propane in the summer.

We are medically driven and the summer is

all about making sure that people who have asthma and COPD, all of those things that

we take care of and we work with in our clinic, all of those people,

we want to make sure that they can breathe in the summer.

We can put blankets on.

But once you get naked, you can't get any cooler.

And so I used to tell my staff that because I was always the hotter than

I mean, you I mean, how do you how do you get coal hot?

I mean, you know, there are many things we can do.

I mean, I've always been a supporter of

the fan program like Carolina D for older Oldrich.

I mean, a 25 dollar fan.

You don't realize how much that can change somebody's life.

And it makes a big, big difference.

And we've partner with them in the past

because we do fans and air conditioners also.

Yeah. And so it's and we also help fix central

air units in the summertime and then we help pay electric bills.

So that's a big help for summer because the one thing people want to do, you may

cut down your heat in the winter, but in the summer you will cut your air.

And we've even had neighbors call us to

assist with elderly neighbors that they know don't have air.

Can you help them?

And then we want to be there and do that.

And then the last program that we have was just say the second to the last

program that we had under the Heat program is our pilot program.

And PIP stands for a percentage of income

payment plan, kind of a tongue twister, but percentage of income payment plan.

And what PIP does is if you are on the AEP or Columbia Gas or Ohio Edison, those are

regulated utilities under the Public Utilities Commission.

And the governor actually signs a a a law

every October stating that a hundred and seventy five dollars.

And for your listeners, this.

As for anybody, whether you come to us and

get help or not, the winner reconnect order states that one

hundred and seventy five dollars can be spent at either AEP or Columbia gas or you

can split it and give half the 175 AP, the other half to Columbia gas and keep your

utilities on for 30 days if you're in stress and threat of disconnect.

So we have that.

And so with PIP does is it works with those people to stabilize the household.

You've been in crisis. We help you.

What happens next month? Right.

What we do is look at your income.

And if you are hundred and fifty percent

or below the poverty level, you're getting that 800 dollar Social Security check.

We only look at six percent of that income to pay your utility bill.

So you would pay 48 dollars to AEP and forty eight dollars to Columbia gas for

your for your monthly bill, no matter how much your usage is.

So if you cut that you're elderly and with

COPD and you cut that air up in the summer and that bill is one hundred and fifty

dollars, if your income is a hundred, you only owe forty eight dollars a month.

Yeah.

It makes it, it makes it doable for people.

Right.

If it places them out or takes them out of survival mode and places them in

maintenance, I'm not worried now if I'm going to have gas or electric.

Well you know, income has not gone up, but

utilities have rent, has house buying, food has everything else has gone up.

And there's still a discussion on living wages.

And so that's

all of these all of these programs are so helpful.

But the issue is how to make sure people

know about how to make sure people know about them.

My my personal philosophy is that

wealth or income or low income or lack of

income is not just about money, but it's about the lack of resources.

There are a lot of programs out here that people just don't know about.

Right. A lot of programs, educational programs

that we may not have at our agency, but we know about them.

We know how to tell you to go learn how to do computer programing.

We can tell you where to go learn the construction trade so you can come out,

make more money that may not necessarily be on the radio.

Right. But as Brett mentioned, what we try to do

in this podcast program is not just talk about the issue, but provide resources.

So as a reminder to all of our listeners today, when you go to our website and this

episode's site, then our show notes will include all of these resources.

So

take a look and utilize those resources.

That's why we have them.

And in central Ohio, where we're blessed

to have as much as we do have here to help people.

All right. Yeah, and then just and just saying that

to Ohio was one of the few states, one of 13 states that has a program like that.

So we are blessed to be in Ohio because a

lot of states don't have a program that is income base for your utilities.

And so you have actually seen deaths on the news from people who froze to death

or overheated because they didn't have a program like the state of Ohio has.

So I'm really proud of Ohio for that. Wonderful.

Well, I.

I want to go back to that educating decision makers and government officials

about air quality, environmental factors and such.

Can you provide some insight on issues that our decision makers are addressing

with your guidance and support right now or the future?

Yes. So we work with also our local health

department, the city, the county, the state.

And they are actually phenomenal.

They are actually listen to our

representatives and they listen to those of us who don't really have a voice.

And so they actually give us a voice. I feel like Ohio.

We're very conscientious.

Our legislative representatives are very conscientious and do listen to our needs.

And so I've gotten to know

just several of them because we have grants that we receive from them.

But also, again,

they represent the clinics and organizations such as ourself to help buoy

up our community and make it healthier and stronger.

And so I really think that we're really fortunate to have such good

representatives that do listen to our needs.

And if there is a need, they listen and it's not perfect.

But because of that and like I said, the

Charitable Health Network, they they represent Ohio and other organizations,

free clinics such as ourselves and the National Association of Free Clinics.

They take it on a national level.

So and then what they do is they'll ask.

US, where do you need help?

What what do you need help with?

You need help with medications.

Do you need help with what do you need help with?

So that we can notify our legislators where actually they'll say, oh, we're

going to have we're going to meet our legislators.

So all of the free clinics have a representative there so that if they want

to ask you can you can tell them about your clinic or your organization.

So we're very fortunate in Ohio to have, you know, representatives that listen.

Right.

And that's all you can ask for is a pair of ears.

Mm hmm. Yes.

Just listen right now and especially those

that are on the front line, this is what's going on.

We have yes, of course, we have skin in

the game because we want to help these people.

Right.

And we were telling you about the problems because, again, most legislators don't

have that access point to people that are in need.

So they have to rely on your gut, your good judgment, your insight.

Right on these are the best practices.

And this is what this is what we're asking.

And oh, I'm sorry.

No, no, no.

What we what I love is I love what I do.

And I wish that I feel like I get to be the benefactor of all their hard work and

and where they will send their and the our resources to.

And I, I wish that they got to see who we treat is so nice to say,

you know, our patient, when they finally get the right medication and they get what

we're telling them and they go, oh I don't have to go to the E.R. I haven't been to

the E.R. since I have been taking this medication.

I go, oh, that's music to my ears.

And or they they thank you for the work that you do.

And it's there's a string of people behind me that are helping us do what we do.

And so it's a very rewarding

position that I have.

And I kind of wish that everyone had the

opportunity to see it on my end and they don't get thanked like they should.

Well, I was just going to say that we do a really good job of of beating the

legislators over the head when we don't agree with them.

But from my time working in a nonprofit, they demand a lot of information, but they

are truly behind the non-profits because they know how critical it is.

They can't do everything.

And if they really utilize the services of

and strengthen the services of the nonprofits, a lot can get done.

And I think that came to fruition during the covid

funding when non-profits were able to get money.

I was really concerned that, you know,

businesses which definitely needed help were going to get funding.

But the nonprofits also benefited from that that funding.

So, yeah. So it is a two way street.

You know, they do demand, but they are

supporting one of the other programs that I think that we have all sort of chuckled

with when we see the turkey on Thanksgiving, talk about getting, you

know, going cold turkey for smoking in Ohio is oh, my gosh, we are so far

behind in helping people understand the issues of smoking.

I know that there are cessation programs at the Breathing Association.

It's a kind of a hot topic.

I'll bet our listeners would like to hear

how you know your thoughts and and recommendations and services.

Well, I am going to turn that over to our clinic director, our nurse practitioner.

I will say this, that I believe the

breathing association is the little red engine that could.

Yeah, and six years ago when I first came

to the Breathing Association, we tackled Smoke Free Columbus.

Oh. And we were part of that coalition.

And we pushed and pushed and worked and

worked with the legislators and people like Dr.

Rob Crane and and other community leaders

and were able to get it not only in Columbus, but now we're Smokefree Ohio.

And I think most of our listeners know how

important it is when you go to other states and you sit in a restaurant or you

sit somewhere that doesn't have smoke free, what that really is like.

And so I'm proud of our agency and our legacy of what we've done here in Ohio.

And I'm going to turn it over on what we've taken that and build it to.

Well, it's interesting that you, Carol, that you talk about that quit cold turkey.

And believe it or not, quitting cold

turkey is the statistically the least effective way to quit smoking.

I a sort of not surprised,

but unfortunately, Ohio is one of the higher ranked, I wouldn't say one of the

top five when it comes to there's a couple that beat us.

But in the amount of people who smoke.

But approximately 22 percent of Ohioans

adored Ohioans smoke, which is pretty high.

And around 480000 Americans die in the U.S. secondary to.

Are you smoking and believe it or not, 41000 of those men and women who are

exposed to secondhand smoke are died due to smoking secondhand twice.

And so what we do is we work very hard to educate people to quit smoking.

So smoking cessation is one of our

big components of what we do when we see people.

We also are one of the organizations, one in 20, that are accredited

organization that teaches other health care professionals, caseworker's

community health workers, respiratory therapist, nurses.

And we actually help certify other providers and health care

professionals in quitting to teach tobacco

treatment specialist to become certified as a 30 CCU accredited dated program.

And it's a great a way for us to get it

out there to teach other professionals how to educate our community in quitting

smoking, because it's such a huge problem, especially in Ohio.

I was working at one of the large universities when

we became smoke free and I would sit in a room with our

executive committee, had seven people and five smoked.

It literally was a blue haze through that room.

And I I've always told my family, you

know, if I if I end up with lung cancer, it's all secondhand smoke.

And there you go. Yes.

So we so we we try to tell people.

So they'll say, I'm going to quit tomorrow, like tomorrow.

That sounds great. I have a plan.

And so there's smoking cessation aids out there.

But just to let everyone know cold turkey

is the least effective, some have done it, which is great.

But so if somebody wanted to to create a plan.

Yeah.

So there's workshops that they can participate in.

Is that. Yes.

So there's the well.

One the breathing association.

So a lot of times I do consultations over the phone to read and have to see me.

We don't have to come in.

So we do consultations, we follow a program, we we come up with a plan.

It's patient guided.

So you tell me and we go from there.

But there's also the Ohio Quitline where

unfortunately most of our insurances do not pay for cessation aids like nicotine

patches, gum, and they're kind of expensive.

And so people are always a little bit

hesitant to buy Apache's, even though you say, well, the cost of smoking is two

hundred and fifty dollars, approximately cost of a patch is ninety dollars.

And they go, wow, I can't afford ninety dollars.

But the thing is, is that you're not buying two hundred and fifty dollars worth

of cigarets in a month if you're buying it little by little.

So it's hard to get people to understand that.

Well if you do here now save less, more

and all the health benefits, but the oil quitline will actually

send you some patches and or nicotine gum or lozenges for free in the mail.

So we work with that and send referrals as

well so that you can get cessation aids to get you started.

We talked about that will we will be

providing resources to our listeners and we know where our listeners are.

Majority them in central Ohio.

But we also know we have listeners outside

of of the Columbus area, central Ohio area outside of Ohio, quite frankly.

Do you have any resource information that's useful for across the U.S.?

Oh, well, I usually tell people who will call.

I have we've had a lot of how of state

people will call us and say, hey, I need this or that.

And we're go, where are you? I'm in Minnesota.

So what we tell them is to look and look

up in the website and look up their county and the state that they're in.

And there's always be free clinics that will say, you know, look up your county,

your state and free clinics and you'll always be able to pop up there.

And so I tell people prior to just showing

up, call them ahead and say make sure that their services match yours.

If you're a pregnant woman and you want to

talk to me about union issues, I'm not your girl.

So I always tell them, make sure that your services match, make sure that you meet

the criteria guidelines that they have set.

So that's usually the bestchoice.

And there's a million smoking cessation programs that are out there.

So you find one, it's tailored to you.

But that's where I usually tell people to start.

And I would think, too, that their own

physician, their own if they have a personal doctor,

that there should be some information through that doctor or through the

hospital system that the doctor's connected.

If they don't, you might want to find another doctor.

I would think that would be readily available with that.

Yeah, but in most hospitals have their own

free clinics associated with them and their own guidelines.

But I always tell them, just give them a call, give them a look so that.

You don't get on this wild goose chase and and get lost in the mix.

Right, Alicia? The American Lung Association then does

also have some information that could be informational to folks.

Educational materials. Yes.

Yes, COPD.

So if you have questions about your chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or

asthma, sleep apnea, those kind of issues, you could go there.

I'm thinking the American Heart Association also has that information.

So those are also good. Absolutely.

Absolutely. And I like that they even have interactive

they'll even have interactive quizzes for you and and and

information in PDF form so you can print them off and learn from them yourself.

OK, well, we will we will again add those to our list of resources.

OK.

And Carol, I just want to tell you a little bit, the clinic.

So we also we are 100 percent free clinics, but we do not charge any co-pays.

So a lot of seniors who come to see us, they they might have a pulmonologist, but

I'll see them on that side because they don't have to pay a seventy

five dollar copay and we can help them with their medications as well.

So if someone has no health insurance, we can still get you help with inhalers.

Inhalers are so expensive.

Around four hundred fifty to seven hundred and fifty dollars.

And that's just for one inhaler.

So a lot of people go, I don't have health insurance.

I'm glad you're here because you're the reason why we're open.

So people like you who are working don't have health insurance, can't afford it.

We can still provide you with inhalers and medical equipment.

So we have nebulizers and blood pressure.

So blood pressure cuffs.

And so we do quite a bit of services as well.

So and we have a mobile medical unit that

we take out twice a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays out in the community to

food pantries, homeless shelters, to Section eight housing for elderly.

So that's where we were today, just here

in Columbus, in front of one on Rich Street today.

So we get out in the community to get to you as much as possible, because if you

have to take two busses, that's really hard.

If you have to walk and you have COPD, it gets tricky.

So we try to get in your backyard.

You know, this goes back to our our

previous comment about how much the nonprofits do in our community and

trying to tell people.

Give them information.

The problem that we have are folks don't know what they don't know.

Right.

So our I guess our message to our listeners is to ask questions, even if you

think, oh, the breathing association can't help me.

Well, you know, they may be able to tell you who can.

Absolutely. We will never turn anyone away.

But, you know, so they might know more about the program because they've done it

before and they might not know about the clinic.

And so any of the resources, we will move you on and touch base.

It's not just the breathing association making all these changes.

It's also we use all the resources we have

available because we're a free clinic and we don't have a lot of money.

Right. So we try to connect you to other

organizations that will get you to where you need to be.

Right.

And it's a bigger problem than a lot of people now.

Mm hmm. Oh, the breathing association.

We might take 17000 applications a year

for utility assistance when we're sitting with that person and

they say to us, I'm sharing an inhaler with two other people.

I call that the friends and family

program, that's the real thing, and I'm sitting there stunned.

And so here we have this medical model for he was our next logical step when we're

hearing things like that, and that was to create the clinic and to create the mobile

health van because we set ourselves up as a medical home energy assistance program.

And so the medically vulnerable are coming in.

And we're hearing 64 percent when I did

the needs assessment, 64 percent of that people that were serving smoked.

Fifty percent are obese.

I think it was something like 44 percent

had asthma or someone in the home had asthma, and so they had

to have the clinic and to have a nurse practitioner go out in the community

and meet them where their needs are and where they live and where they play it,

because sometimes they may not live there, but they play there where our recreation

centers and where at those nonprofits that they already trust.

So we're partnering with that with that agency you already trust.

So where they haven't gone to a doctor in

10 years, I'll go to gladdened house because I trust gladdened house.

Therefore, I trust the breathing association's mobile van.

And so we're at the Glan house and the guy at McGill and the Urban League.

And we're at all of these places because

we're able to meet people in their communities.

And so you're right, the resources are so

necessary, they don't necessarily know about it.

But if we can get you a gate open on just

one item, we can link you to everything else that you're telling us.

You have needs for it.

And, you know, I think to people start they hear breathing as the issue thinks,

smoking and immediately say, well, all they have to do is quit.

And and and no one there's it's a lot more complex than that.

And number two, there are a lot of

breathing issues that have nothing to do with a behavior that can be changed.

That's right. And that's right.

So listeners to don't forget all of these wonderful nonprofits that we talk about in

central Ohio always need your support, too.

Mm hmm. And so think about that.

Right.

Any other words of wisdom you'd like to provide our listeners today?

I say stay vaccinated.

Get vaccinated. Thank you.

Go to your primary care provider, follow up and take your medicine as prescribed.

And amazing how many ills that takes care of dying.

I know. Really, really it does.

I know it sounds like it's a beating, you know, a dead horse, but honestly but

it's honestly the 100 percent gospel truth that you get vaccinated.

Follow up. We can help you.

And and Alicia's a nurse practitioner, our nurse practitioner mine.

My nurse practitioner, Stacey Kelly did another podcast with us on telehealth.

I absolute big fan of all the nurse practitioners in central Ohio.

And I guess my words of wisdom would be to

not allow shame or guilt to stop you from seeking help.

I think for so many of the new

unemployed, because of Colvert, you don't know where to go or who to talk to.

You may be ashamed for the first time

you're out of work or you're underemployed for the first time.

Call us.

You know, we're respectful.

We keep your dignity intact.

So do a lot of the other agencies here in Columbus.

And I think that we all and not just Columbus and your listeners are central

Ohio in so many of the surrounding counties.

They want to help. They're there to help.

We're here to help. And we understand it's temporary.

Right. All right.

We understand your situation is temporary.

During the last recession, when all those

middle managers lost their position and we had folks at my agency literally out the

door, the one thing I always said to them is, you know, giving up is not an option.

Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

And and you all are really providing everybody the support they need.

So they, you know, given up is just not going to happen.

All right. All right.

Well, thanks for joining us today.

This has been great, enlightening and and hopefully, you know, provide enough

energy that someone listening going, yeah, I need to do that.

Oh, my my neighbor. I need to get my neighbor connected.

If it's not that person's like your mother inhaler.

That's right.

But I the family of friends, I own the family friend program.

I get it. Exactly.

Yeah. Thanks a lot for being here with us.

And I know this is great resources for those that do need it for sure.

Thank you so much.