SHEEP INC HEALTH CARE CENTER

Those who cannot afford and don't have insurance are the patients who come to SIHCC. The clinic has a corps of volunteers that include physicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, nurses, and support staff that are dedicated to this service program. The doors of the clinic open every Thursday evening providing free care to an average of 20 clients. The patient population the clinic serves has grown 100% since the doors opened. We serve uninsured children, adults, the homeless and people of multi-ethnic and racial backgrounds. The clinic served 913 patients, 274 of which were new and 639 were duplicated visits in 2016. 33% of that number represents new patients.
We opened an expansion site in a neighboring economically challenged community in December 2015. We are open once a month, the first Saturday of the month, and set up in a chiropractor's office. We open the doors every month to about 8 patients. Services offered to the underserved include, school physicals, well child checks, diagnosis and treatment of acute conditions such as otitis, pharyngitis, sinusitis, bronchitis, pneumonia, gastroenteritis, soft tissue infections, rashes, bites/stings, minor injuries, UTIs. The clinic also services clients with chronic medical conditions such as COPD, Diabetes, Hypertension, Arthritis, Heart disease. In addition to evaluating the client, the providers are able to order basic laboratory and imaging tests to support their diagnosis and to guide therapy. Each of our patients actively participates in all the management decisions. The clinical is does not provide emergency services.

We partner with individuals, churches, local community and civic organizations, and other non-profits - financially, volunteers, and services - to provide the free medical care to our patients without insurance. Quest Diagnostics, Premier Imaging Associates, and Monroeville Imaging Center work with the clinic to provide services at a discount to us and our patients. Monroeville Assembly of God provides space for both the clinic and office space and local pharmacies work with the clinic on prescription costs. We have many local donors both with the fundraising efforts and monthly donors and also with the in-kind donations to meet some of the disposable needs for the clinic. We collaborate for reduced Rx for our patients with the local pharmacies – Giant Eagle Pharmacy and CVS in Monroeville, Keystone Pharmacy in Turtle Creek, and Lost and Found Pharmacy in Penn Hills. We can offer discount, at cost prescriptions to our patients when they have to pay for it through Lost and Found Pharmacy, a nonprofit pharmacy in a neighboring community and also Keystone Pharmacy in Turtle Creek. We forged a partnership with Forbes Hospital to provide primary care for the uninsured with the goal of working toward a healthy community, reducing return visits to the ER, and connecting our patients to the hospital's charity and assistance programs. They also offer us free MRIs and CT Scans for our most needy patients.. We work with Adagio Health Services, referring our patients for more comprehensive medical care. We have also networked with YWCA for social services and healthcare insurance counseling for our patients. We connect our patients to free and charitable clinics around the city that provide comprehensive services that we cannot provide. The Rotary Club of Monroeville has been a long-standing partner with the clinic, both financially and by helping make connections with other organizations. We partner with the Free Clinic Association of Pennsylvania (FCAP), the National Association of Free and Charitable Clinics (NAFC), and the ECRI Institute. They are invaluable in connecting us to resources for education for our patients and supplies for our clinic. They provide ongoing educational opportunities for providers and administration to effectively run the clinic and provide quality health care to our patients. They are always just a phone call or email away if we have questions. HRSA is also an invaluable resource and partnership to our free clinic, to make sure we are legally and most effectively diagnosing, treating, educating, and caring for the population we serve.

We are blessed with the most experienced and dedicated volunteer staff of 90 to 100 people and growing - made up of doctors, physician assistants, certified registered nurse practitioners, pharmacists, chaplains, insurance counselors, medical assistants, office supervisors and assistants, nurses, and greeters. They are invested in making the free clinic a place where people receive the quality health care they need with love and respect. All medical volunteers are all credentialed and privileged to do the jobs they are volunteering to do and have their malpractice through the FTCA. We are also blessed to be a project of Monroeville Assembly of God, who is our major stakeholder. They provide the facilities to hold the clinic and its offices. They also human resources as well. We have regular and consistent individual and business/community financial support that continues to grow. And the national and state free clinic associations, the federal government, and ECRi Institute are an endless supply of Information resources -knowledge, databases, and client support etc.

Since opening to 1 patient in 2010. We have provided healthcare to over 1,000 people a year over the last 4 years. We have also opened a second location in a neighboring, struggling community in 2015. We continue to strive to improve the quality of care we provide our patients by partnering with other nonprofit organizations to provide services we cannot, by establishing a follow up program and on-duty nurse program for the improved health outcomes of our patients, and this year have laid the foundation of a chronic disease management and prevention program for our diabetic patients. We are continuing to engage our volunteer basis in the growth of our clinic and the scope of the services we provide and to ensure its quality.

Our board made an official decision in the Fall of 2017 to start actively looking for an independent facility to set up and run our clinic. Right now we set up, run , and tear down our clinic every Thursday night in the children's education wing of Monroeville Assembly of God. We are limited in our ability to grow and the services we can offer. It would be our first choice to move into a shared facility with Monroeville Assembly of God's outreach ministry, Sheep Inc. The board has been laying the foundation over the last 6 months and will continue to in the months to come of what needs to be in place for that dream to happen. Once we have our own space, we will be able open more often and provide more services like dental and mental health.

As of the summer of 2019, we obtained a space through our major sponsor, Monroeville Assembly of God, at their new facility in a neighboring community to set up the clinic permanently. Through a match fund campaign we were able to raise the necessary funds, in tandem with money set aside for the future of the clinic, to start remodeling the space into a primary health care facility. As of April 2020, the remodeling project is almost complete with a projected move in date for the end of summer 2020.