Medical outreach service for vulnerable residents in Okanagan up and running

Medical services are now available to meet the needs of vulnerable Central Okanagan residents where they live.

For the last five weeks Interior Health has rolled out its Integrated Health Outreach team, also known as I-Hot. The medical van equipped with supplies, outreach workers and medical professionals has arrived on the doorsteps of people in precarious situations.

“What we’re trying to do is bridge the gap for health-care access to individuals experiencing homelessness, or living in non-traditional housing settings, like the new tiny homes,” said Emma Guerrero Mohajir, clinical operations manager for Outreach Urban Health.

“We’re trying to bring mobile responsive health care to the Central Okanagan, seven days a week, to really try and support individual health outcomes.”

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While it’s not a new concept in larger urban centres, it’s the first of its kind in the Okanagan. Before this, Interior Health had Outreach Urban Health in downtown Kelowna, where one or two nurses were available at any given time.

With the new van, service capacity has doubled and anyone from West Kelowna to Lake Country experiencing homelessness or living in non-traditional housing settings can get support.

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“If there’s someone out there that looks sick and needs help, we will respond and bring them in,” she said.

“Then we also have a schedule, so we’re hitting locations geographically throughout the Central Okanagan. Every day, we go to different areas to make sure individuals know we’re going to be there at that time.”

The KGH Foundation played a big role in rolling out this initiative.

“With the support of our donors in this community, we were in a position to contribute $260,000 to the purchase of the van,” Allison Young from the KGH Foundation said.

“Caring community is a pillar for us. Of course we support, with our donors, excellence in our hospital and that will always be important … but the more support we can provide for people in community – it actually has a tremendous positive benefit to our hospital”