‘WALKING SCHOOL BUS’ PROJECT LEVERAGES MORE THAN $1 MILLION IN FEDERAL ‘SAFE ROUTES TO SCHOOL’ FUNDS

October 26, 2011

REDWOOD CITY, CA — A $30,000 Sequoia Healthcare District grant that created “walking school buses” in Redwood City schools in June of 2010 has leveraged in excess of $1 million in federal Safe Routes to School funds that will benefit a half-dozen Redwood City schools, thousands of students and their families, bicyclists and pedestrians using major thoroughfares.

Safe Routes to School was authorized by Congress in 2005 to “to enable and encourage children…to walk and bicycle to school, to make bicycling and walking to school a safer and more appealing transportation alternative, thereby encouraging a healthy and active lifestyle from an early age.”
Safe Routes also funds programs “that will improve safety and reduce traffic, fuel consumption, and air pollution in the vicinity (approximately 2 miles) of primary and middle schools.”
Targeted schools and their environs are Hoover, Hawes, Garfield, Fair Oaks, John Gill and Roy Cloud elementary and Adelante Spanish Immersion schools, all in the Redwood City School District.
The City of Redwood City will receive the grants totaling $1.15 million next year through Safe Routes and a federal program administered by the San Mateo City/County Association of Governments and the California Department of Transportation. Redwood City 2020 will administer a $210,000 non-infrastructure grant.
Redwood City 2020 is a partnership of the Redwood City School District, Sequoia Healthcare District, the City of Redwood City, Sequoia Union High School District, San Mateo County, Kaiser Permanente, Sequoia Healthcare District, and the John W. Gardner Center for Youth and Their Communities at Stanford University.
Redwood City 2020 Executive Director Patricia Brown thanked Sequoia Healthcare District for providing the funding and the focus that brought to light the federal funding opportunities.
The Walking School Bus at Fair Oaks School in June of 2010 led to the establishment of Sequoia Healthcare District’s Healthy Schools Initiative.
This three-year, minimum $6 million commitment to public school districts in central and southern San Mateo County is funding school nurses, wellness coordinators, physical education instructors, nutrition education programs and school gardens for more than 23,000 public school students.

According to Nadine Levin, consultant to Redwood City 2020, Sequoia Healthcare District funding allowed 2020 to “really concentrate on the Safe Routes to School issue, to look for other funding sources and work with the schools in the Redwood City School District.”
Federal sources say that the number of children walking or bicycling to school has plummeted over the last 40 years. Where 50 percent of children did so in 1969, only 15 percent do today. The federal government links this decline to a sedentary lifestyle that makes children at risk for a variety of health problems, including obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. It’s not for want to desire that more parents shuttle children to school by car. Traffic danger consistently ranks as the chief concern of those who do not let their children walk to school.
The new grant funds will pay for professional walk-ability assessments and create a task force that includes a host of stakeholders, including the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Department, Redwood City Police, school administrators, parents, city planning officials and others. The goal is to establish sustainable programs at each of the six schools that increase walking and cycling.
In addition, the funds will pay for design of pedestrian and bicycle improvements at three intersections on Hudson Street between Whipple Avenue and Woodside Road and improvements near Hoover School.
“Redwood City 2020 appreciates Sequoia Healthcare District’s initial support for the Walking School Bus and Safe Routes to School,” Executive Director Brown said. “With this help from our valued partner, Redwood City 2020 has been able to leverage much-needed resources to make walking and biking to school an everyday occurrence.”
A walking school bus is a carefully coordinated activity involving students, parents, teachers and administrators that gets school-bound children out of cars at some distance from school and walking under supervision the rest of the way.
Sequoia Healthcare District’s funding was provided as part of the district’s Healthy Schools Initiative, the first application of the federal Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Coordinated School Health Model by a healthcare district in the State of California.
“Partnering with Redwood City 2020 to improve the level of safety of children as they increase their daily physical activity by biking and walking to school aligns with the goals of Healthy Schools,” said Pamela Kurtzman, Director of the Healthy Schools Initiative. “We applaud Redwood City 2020 for their diligence in leveraging these resources.”
Sequoia Healthcare District returns approximately $10 million annually to the community in the form of nonprofit grants, district initiatives and education programs on tax earnings of approximately $8 million.
The district serves the cities of Atherton, Belmont, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside and portions of San Mateo and Foster City from Skyline Boulevard to the Bay.

SEQUOIA HEALTHCARE DISTRICT TO PROVIDE
CHRONIC DISEASE SELF-MANAGEMENT INSTRUCTION
FOR RESIDENTS

REDWOOD CITY — With an estimated 30,000 chronic disease sufferers within the district, Sequoia Healthcare District will now provide free chronic disease self-management instruction under a pilot program modeled after a Stanford University Medical School curriculum and approved by directors this week.

The first instructor will be District Chief Executive Officer Lee Michelson, who fulfills the Stanford requirement for instructors because he also suffers from rheumatoid arthritis, a chronic disease.

Michelson has completed a four-day, 32-hour training program required by Stanford.

The pilot program approved on a vote Wednesday can fund up to 25 classes per year at an estimated cost to the district of $1,000 per class. In addition to instruction, Sequoia Healthcare District will provide each class member a textbook, Living a Healthy Life With Chronic Conditions, and an audio relaxation tape, Time for Healing, both of which are required.

The pilot program will start with one or two classes, Michelson indicated. Participants, who must be chronic disease patients or their caregivers, must commit to weekly two and one-half-hour training sessions for six weeks. The curriculum requires two instructors per class, one or both of whom are chronic disease sufferers and both of whom have been through instructor training.

The program has proved to be both effective for the participants managing chronic conditions and cost-effective for health providers. A controlled study of 1,000 participants with heart disease, lung disease, stroke or arthritis done by Stanford showed the program derived reductions in healthcare costs that were four times the cost of the program.

Compared to non-participants, participants showed “significant improvements in exercise, cognitive symptom management, communication with physicians, self-reported general health, health distress, fatigue, disability, and social/role activities limitations. They also spent fewer days in the hospital, and there was also a trend toward fewer outpatients visits and hospitalizations,” according to the study.

The pilot program represents the first time Sequoia Healthcare District will involve itself directly in chronic disease self-management.

Presently a portion of the district’s Caring Community grant to the Edgewood Center for Children and Families funds a chronic disease self-management program, but it reaches only about 40 people a year.

Sequoia Healthcare District does operate two community health programs directly — HeartSafe, which places automated external defibrillators in public places and provides Lucas chest compression devices to area emergency personnel, and the Healthy Schools Initiative, a three-year pilot program to provide nurses, wellness coordinators and physical activity instructors in public school districts.

Initial classroom sessions will be held at selected senior or community centers, the locations yet to be established. The healthcare district will draw on its extensive network of community organizations it supports — for example, it has funded 27 nonprofit organizations at a cost of $1.5 million in its 2012 Caring Community Grant Award program — to publicize the availability of the program.

“There is such a tremendous need for this program in the community,” board President Kim Griffin said. “I’m very happy we are getting involved in this.”

Michelson said the $25,000 in funding will come from a budgeted account that was approved by directors for community programs in the current budget but that has not been used.

Sequoia Healthcare District provides major funding to numerous non-profit community health organizations that directly assist more 35,000 women, children and seniors in the district, which includes the cities of Atherton, Belmont, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside, and portions of San Mateo and Foster City from Skyline Boulevard to the Bay.

SEQUOIA HEALTHCARE DISTRICT
REVIEWS FIVE-YEAR STRATEGIC PLAN

REDWOOD CITY/Tuesday, Sept. 27, 2011 — A more expansive statement of its mission and a clearer view of future revenues and use of reserve funds are possible outcomes of a study session of the Sequoia Healthcare District Board of Directors held today to review where the district stands halfway through its five-year strategic plan.

Though it was a study session and no votes were taken, discussion and board give-and-take appeared to form consensus around some issues. Other suggested changes to district goals did not generate much discussion or support.

A change to its mission statement, carefully crafted in 2009 through a collaboration with community members, district directors and a consulting team, garnered generally positive comments — inserting the word “all” to make it read, “Sequoia Healthcare District’s mission is to improve the quality of life for all District residents by enhancing access to healthcare services and by supporting and encouraging programs and activities designed to achieve health, wellness, and disease prevention.”

Comments suggested that the district considers itself responsible for all segments of population within its boundaries, insured and uninsured, hospital patients or patients of public health clinics, young, old and in-between. The district currently operates two major programs, HeartSafe and Healthy Schools, funds a nursing education collaborative with San Francisco State University and Cañada College, matches donations to the nonprofit Sequoia Hospital Foundation, supports the county’s Healthy Kids program and grants funding to 27 community nonprofits.

On the financial side, consensus seemed to be that the approved goal of preparing a five-year revenue and expenditure plan and revising it every year is unrealistic because the district — and, perhaps, no one — has the foresight to be able to predict with accuracy what the financial picture will be like five years down the road, especially when federal healthcare reform is about to change how doctors, insurers and hospitals are paid and how healthcare needs of a much larger population of insureds will be served.

However, district CEO Lee Michelson reported, financial staff with Catholic Healthcare West (CHW), the operator

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Sequoia Hospital, have said they will attempt to project three to five years into the future the amount of revenue Sequoia Healthcare District will receive from the hospital on an annual basis. Catholic Healthcare West and the district negotiated a compensation package when ownership of the hospital transferred to CHW in the late 90s. Under the agreement CHW makes a payment once a year based on its earnings before interest, depreciation and amortization (EBIDA).

EBIDA payments have ranged between $2.3 and more than $6.7 million. CHW’s projections could help the district budget programs more reliably. Directors generally commented that projections longer than three years would not be necessary because conditions five years out would be impossible to predict.

Guided by Tuesday’s discussion, CEO Michelson will formulate a new goals document to be voted upon by directors at a future agendized board meeting.

Eighteen School-Based Nonprofits to Receive Healthy Schools Grants

REDWOOD CITY/Aug. 18, 2011 — More than 28,000 Peninsula children returning to school this month and next will have the benefit of fitness, mental and social health programs, counseling and nutrition education, thanks to an innovative collaboration created by Sequoia Healthcare District in association with eight public school districts.

To commemorate the second year of Sequoia’s Healthy Schools Initiative, the district will host 18 school-based nonprofit organizations at its inaugural Healthy Schools Grants Reception Thursday, Aug. 18 to distribute more than $400,000 in grant funds benefiting public school students.

Sequoia Healthcare District’s Healthy School’s Initiative represents a three-year, $6 million commitment to public schools.

It is the only initiative of its kind in California to be undertaken by a public healthcare district as it applies the federal Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Cooperative School Health model for the improvement of public health.

Grant recipients include Sequoia High School’s Peninsula Team Ascent program, Center for Youth’s life skills program, Hidden Villa’s school garden and nutrition education, Peninsula Conflict Resolution’s school-based life skills and violence prevention training for at-risk youth,

Serve the Peninsula’s counseling and mental health education program for at-risk freshmen, Menlo-Atherton High’s parent training, the Redwood City Education Foundation’s All Wellness mini-grants, Sequoia Union High School District’s adolescent counseling services, counseling and mental health programs at Woodside High, Star-Vista’s Healthy Sequoia Program at Sequoia High, pre-school child development programs for low-income students attending the College of San Mateo, Teen Talk health education for Redwood City, San Carlos and Belmont students, court and community schools counseling by Cleo Eulau Center, grant awards for Footsteps Afterschool healthy eating programs, garden-based nutrition education through UC Cooperative Extension, Collective Roots school gardens and drug and alcohol prevention programs for 13 through 19 year-olds through El Centro de Libertad.

Cash-strapped public schools have all but eliminated these and similar programs as budget reductions have pared all public school budgets. Sequoia Healthcare District stepped in several years ago by funding school nurses in schools where thousands of students had lost access to them. Last year the district decided to adopt and fund the CDC’s school health model, a step usually taken by large school districts in the state that had access to the funding to support it.

Grants to be distributed Thursday supplement more than $2 million to be distributed this year directly to every school district within Sequoia Healthcare District to provide school nurses, wellness directors, nutrition educators, physical education instructors and related staff.

School districts supported include Belmont-Redwood Shores, Las Lomitas, Menlo Park City, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, and Woodside elementary school districts and the Sequoia Union High School District.

Sequoia Healthcare District provides major funding to numerous non-profit community health organizations that directly assist more 35,000 women, children and seniors in the district, which includes the cities of Atherton, Belmont, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside, and portions of San Mateo and Foster City from Skyline Boulevard to the Bay.

HeartSafe Has Its Day in San Mateo County Aug. 9

REDWOOD CITY, CA, Aug. 9, 2011 — Tuesday was “HeartSafe Day” in San Mateo County with the latest lifesaving equipment donated to fire service agencies by Sequoia Healthcare District credited with more than 50 successful deployments on emergency cardiac arrest calls in the first few months of the program.

The latest “save” coincidentally occurred Monday, the day before San Mateo County Supervisors proclaimed “HeartSafe Program Day.” Woodside Fire chief Daniel Ghiorso reported that a bicyclist collapsed and was revived by firefighters using one of the six Lucas^® chest compression devices the healthcare district donated to the community.

“I am happy to report that the first responders and emergency personnel now using this device are giving us rave reviews,” said Kim Griffin, President of the Sequoia Healthcare District Board of Directors in a report to the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors.

This is the fifth anniversary of Sequoia Healthcare District’s HeartSafe program, which has placed more than 300 automated external defibrillators in schools, recreation centers, senior centers and other public places throughout the district, has installed two Code Blue® video-equipped, two-way communicating AED towers in the district and has donated six Lucas® CPR devices, one for each of the six fire service agencies in the district.

In their resolution honoring HeartSafe, supervisors cited the more than $1 million community investment the HeartSafe program has represented.

Sequoia Healthcare District provides major funding to numerous non-profit community health organizations that directly assist more 35,000 men, women, children and seniors in the district, which includes the cities of Atherton, Belmont, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside, and portions of San Mateo and Foster City from Skyline Boulevard to the Bay.

The district has received uniformly positive feedback from emergency personnel who have used the Lucas^® devices.

Some typical examples: “I have used the Lucas device once and it worked incredibly well…”(Olson, FCFD); “I am usually skeptical of new gimmicks given to us but it was awesome. It was like having a fourth man on the rig…”(Fox, E10); “I have used it two or three times and each time it has worked great!…”(S. Martin, E10).

The Lucas^® CPR device is a portable, quick-to-assemble power unit and wishbone-shaped structure that encircles the cardiac arrest victim’s chest. The power unit, which has versions that can be operated either by firefighters’ standard-issue air supply or by battery, operates a piston and suction cup that administers 100 two-inch chest compressions per minute. It both presses and expands the chest cavity, delivering oxygenated blood to the brain on compression and to the heart muscle on expansion, a feat human CPR cannot do.

Supervisor Don Horsley, until last year an elected director of the Sequoia Healthcare District, also reflected on Sequoia Healthcare Districts’ grants program, which amounts to more than $1.6 million in community support this year.

“This year for seniors they have six grants for a total of $300,000,” Supervisor Horsley said. “Mental health programs, total help $100,000. Food and basic services, six grants for over $400,000. Children’s health, seven grants for over $350,000…in addition they help us with our Fair Oaks Clinic for operations for over $1 million and have pledged over $4 million for a new clinic in North Fair Oaks — an initiative appreciated both by myself and by Supervisor Rose Jacobs Gibson.

“You’re a phenomenal partner for the county and have done a wonderful job for the community,” he concluded.

Healthcare district board President Griffin replied, “We are proud to have been able to provide these devices to all six fire service agencies in the district. And I’m also very pleased to announce today that we are donating another six devices to first responders this year.”

She also pointed out in remarks before supervisors that the chest compression and Code Blue technologies were not even invented when the HeartSafe program began as a defibrillator program, and the district is looking forward to deploying newer technologies as they are developed.

Griffin recognized members of the HeartSafe team on hand for the presentation, including Healthcare District Director Katie Kane, Stephani Scott, former Sequoia Healthcare District CEO and founder of the HeartSafe program, current CEO Lee Michelson, Glenn Nielsen, HeartSafe Program Director, Pamela Kurtzman, former HeartSafe Program Director and representatives of several of the fire service agencies benefitting by the donation.

The presentation included a demonstration of the device by Jennifer Hughes, sales representative of manufacturer Physio-Control, Inc., a division of Medtronic.

Sequoia Healthcare District’s HeartSafe Program Celebrates Five Years of Lifesaving Technology

Automated External Defibrillators, Lucas^® CPR Devices, Code Blue^® Remotely-Operated AED Towers Deployed

The Lucas^® Chest Compression Device

The Lucas^® device in use

Automated External Defibrillator

Code Blue^® AED Tower

BACKGROUNDER

HeartSafe Program

Sudden cardiac arrest (SCA), a condition in which the heart stops suddenly and unexpectedly due to a malfunction in its electrical system, claims more than 325,000 American lives every year and can strike anyone, of any age, at any time. Application of an electric shock delivered by a small device called a defibrillator or Automated External Defibrillator (AED) stops the chaotic heartbeat, allowing the heart to reset and start beating normally.

2006
Directors of the Sequoia Healthcare District establish the HeartSafe program to place AEDs in public places, emergency responder vehicles, schools, community centers and similar locations throughout its service area. The district covers Atherton, Belmont, the Emerald Hills area, parts of Foster City and San Mateo, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood Shores, Redwood City, San Carlos and Woodside.
HeartSafe includes community cardio-pulmonary (CPR) training.
Since 2006 the district’s program has placed more than 300 AEDs throughout the district and has trained more than 5,000 individuals in CPR.

2010
Sequoia Healthcare District provides residents with the next advance in community heart health, the Code Blue^® tower technology. Code Blue® is a networked, video- and audio-equipped, permanent AED installation that allows for two-way communication and rapid dispatch of emergency personnel to the tower site. Code Blue® towers have been placed at Sequoia High School’s very popular Terremere Field and at Woodside High School.
Code Blue^® is faster than the 9-1-1 system because it connects directly to the emergency responder, while 9-1-1 can program to different police departments or even the California Highway Patrol and can be busy.

2011
HeartSafe advances again to the next level by purchasing six Lucas^® Chest Compression Devices and donating them to fire protection agencies serving Belmont, Menlo Park, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside and communities and unincorporated areas served by Cal Fire.
CPR requires 1 ¹/₂-inch chest compressions 100 times per minute, a feat almost no human can sustain for more than a few minutes. In addition, manual CPR does not re-expand the chest to refill blood chambers. Because they both compress and expand the chest cavity mechanically, Lucas^® devices can perform perfect CPR for hours, if needed. In addition to emergency situations, the devices are deployed in emergency rooms and in medical transport.

Sequoia Healthcare District

Sequoia Healthcare District provides major funding to numerous non-profit community health organizations that directly assist more 35,000 women, children and seniors in the district, which includes the cities of Atherton, Belmont, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside, and portions of San Mateo and Foster City from Skyline Boulevard to the Bay.

In addition to the HeartSafe program, community support includes the Healthy Schools Initiative, which funds wellness and nutrition programs in public schools, funding of three community medical or dental clinics, health insurance for low-income children, matching grants to the Sequoia Hospital Foundation for fundraising and Caring Community grants to 30 community nonprofit organizations.

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July 22, 2011

Jennifer Gabet

Nutrition Manager

Healthy Schools Initiative

Pamela Kurtman

Director

Healthy Schools Initiative

Glenn Nielsen

Director

HeartSafe Program

Nutritionist Jennifer Gabet, MPH, RD Joins Sequoia Healthcare District Healthy Schools Team

REDWOOD CITY, July 22, 2011 — Jennifer Gabet, formerly nutrition program manager with University of California Cooperative Extension, has joined Sequoia Healthcare District staff as Nutrition Manager for the Healthy Schools Initiative (HSI), an innovative, $6.3 million, three-year commitment by the district to fund school nursing and wellness programs in eight area public school districts.

This addition rounds out a year of change in district staffing during which former HeartSafe program manager Pamela Kurtzman moved to become Healthy Schools Initiative Director and former Atherton Chief of Police Glenn Nielsen joined the staff to take over the HeartSafe program.

Staff moves still keep district administrative overhead at less than 5 percent of annual spending. All told, Sequoia Healthcare District returns more than $10 million to the district in programs on $7.95 million in property tax revenue, or approximately $1.30 in programs for every dollar of property tax revenue. A revenue-sharing agreement with Catholic Healthcare West, which owns and operates Sequoia Hospital, and return on investments make up the balance.

Gabet, a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley with a degree in integrative biology, has extensive experience as a health educator, wellness program coordinator and nutrition program manager. She was clinical dietitian at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, Health Education Program advisor at Santa Barbara City College and Wellness Program coordinator for the City of Missoula, Montana before returning to California and UC Cooperative Extension in 2007. Gabet earned her Master of Public Health degree and her Bachelor of Science degree in nutrition and clinical dietetics at UC Berkeley and is a licensed registered dietitian.

At Sequoia Healthcare District she will participate in the first collaboration between a public healthcare district and public school districts to implement the federal Centers for Disease Control’s Coordinated School Health model.

A few very large public school districts in the state have implemented this program, but the participating smaller San Francisco Peninsula destricts within the Sequoia Healthcare District have been beset by state budget reductions and most have all but eliminated school nurses and health and fitness programs such as physical education.

Healthy School Initiative programs directly affect more than 25,000 public school students in the Belmont-Redwood Shores, Las Lomitas, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos and Woodside school districts, the Sequoia Union High School District and Charter Learning Center in San Carlos.

Gabet will coordinate nutrition and wellness programs with the districts and with several nonprofit organizations that have been granted funding to participate in public school gardens.

According to Healthy Schools Initiative Program Director Kurtzman, school gardens are critical platforms for nutrition education.

“From gardens you can learn math, science, nutrition, sustainability and other skills critical to wellness,” she said. “Children in the schools will be made more aware of what they are eatding and will be more interested in the concept of health and wellness.”

Sequoia Healthcare District directors authorized the second year of the initiative at their meeting June 6, reflecting approval of the first year’s experience and confidence in its evolution through the year ahead.

Gabet’s assignment will be to help the funded agencies develop strategies based on their first year’s experiences. They will be tasked with developing new structures and unifying approaches future participants may build upon.

“I am very optimistic about this approach and Jennifer’s abilities,” Kurtzman said. “She is well respected in the school communities where she has worked. She has a positive approach and a well-rounded philosophy focused on inspiring school systems and public school students to make healthy choices — it’s part of her personality makeup and her personality is infectious.”

Sequoia Healthcare District provides major funding to numerous non-profit community health organizations that directly assist more 35,000 women, children and seniors in the district, which includes the cities of Atherton, Belmont, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside, and portions of San Mateo and Foster City from Skyline Boulevard to the Bay.

STAFF BIOGRAPHIES

PAMELA KURTZMAN, MPH

Pamela Kurtzman has a master’s degree in public health and previously worked at Stanford Center for Disease Prevention in heart disease research and as an Exercise Physiologist for the Living Strong, Living Well Program for cancer patients and survivors. She earned a B.S. degree in Exercise Science and pre-med at Arizona State University and a master’s degree in public health from the State University of New York and Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health.

She came to Sequoia Healthcare District in August, 2006 to direct the district’s HeartSafe program, which finances placement of automated external defibrillators in schools, community centers, city facilities, recreation areas, senior citizens’ centers and numerous locations throughout Sequoia Healthcare District.

She was named Director of the district’s Healthy Schools Initiative in July of 2010 and has coordinated the efforts  of numerous government and schools agencies as they innovate programs implementing the Center for Disease Control’s Coordinated School Health Model.

GLENN NIELSEN

A native of Redwood City born at Sequoia Hospital, Glenn Nielsen began his first professional career as a Town of Atherton police cadet in 1975 and rose through the ranks to become the town’s Chief of Police. In that role he became the first chief on the Peninsula to deploy Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs) in police cruisers, among other accomplishments. In his second professional career, as director of Sequoia Healthcare District’s HeartSafe program, which he assumed in 2009 upon his retirement from the chief’s job, he was responsible for deploying numerous AEDs in schools, recreation centers, churches and other public places throughout the district. He holds a B.S. degree from Menlo College and is a graduate of the state Police Officers Standards and Training’s prestigious Command College.

JENNIFER GABET, MPH, RD

Jennifer Gabet, an accomplished academician and an experienced educator in the public sector, was a graduate student instructor in the Nutritional Sciences Department, a health educator in the university’s Health Promotion Unit and ultimately commencement speaker for her college at the University of California, Berkeley. She obtained three degrees at the university, B.A. in Integrative Biology, B.S. in Nutrition and Clinical Dietetics and M.P.H. from the Graduate School of Public Health.

In the university environment she taught courses in nutritional and food sciences, lectured on nutrition, exercise and eating disorders and counseled her peers in a number of wellness programs.

In the public sector she screened and helped provide for nutritional needs of patients in a Santa Barbara community hospital and managed developed and monitored wellness programs in Missoula, Montana. At UC Cooperative Extension she planned and administered USDA-funded nutrition education programs for youth and families and directed various programs and program staff.

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SEQUOIA HEALTHCARE DISTRICT BUDGET
ONCE AGAIN RETURNS MORE TO COMMUNITY HEALTH
THAN IT COLLECTS IN PROPERTY TAX REVENUE

REDWOOD CITY/June 1, 2011 — Continuing a trend begun several years ago, Sequoia Healthcare District Wednesday adopted a new fiscal year budget that returns more funds to community healthcare programs than the district collects in property tax revenues and that keeps administrative costs low enough to be offset entirely by investment revenue.

The 2011-12 budget lists $10.4 million in program and community funding, up from $10.1 million in the previous year, on property tax income of $7.95 million. As it has in the past, the district makes up the balance through an earnings-sharing agreement with Catholic Healthcare West, which operates Sequoia Hospital, and through investment earnings.

Expenses  include: Healthy Schools Initiative, second-year funding to support school nurses and wellness programs serving 23,000 public school children in four school districts, $2.3 million; challenge grant to Sequoia Hospital Foundation for medical equipment fundraising, $1.25 million; HeartSafe, a program which has placed more than 300 automated external defibrillators in public places throughout the district, $250,000; Children’s Health Initiative, a safety net program shared with San Mateo County to help working families and others afford health insurance, $1.35 million; Nursing Education Partnership with San Francisco State University, San Mateo County Community College District and Sequoia Hospital, $1 million; Samaritan House medical clinic, $612,000; Ravenswood-Belle Haven clinic, $250,000; Caring Community grants to 30 nonprofit community organizations providing wellness, mental health, food, shelter, counseling and other services to district residents.

Administrative expenses, at less than five percent of total budget, are down slightly over last year at $585,000. The district employs a chief executive officer, full-time Healthy Schools director, a part-time administative assistant, a part-time HeartSafe coordinator and contracts for legal and professional services.

Sequoia Healthcare District provides major funding to community health organizations that directly assist more 35,000 women, children and seniors in the district, which includes the cities of Atherton, Belmont, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside, and portions of San Mateo and Foster City from Skyline Boulevard to the Bay.

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EXPERTS LAUD SEQUOIA HEALTHCARE DISTRICT NURSING EDUCATION PROGRAM, HEALTHY SCHOOLS INITIATIVE

REDWOOD CITY/June 1, 2011 — A parade of speakers reporting on the successes of Sequoia Healthcare District’s nursing baccalaureate partnership with San Francisco State University and the San Mateo Community College District and on the first-year achievements of the district’s Healthy Schools Initiative validated the faith — and funding — district directors placed in the two programs.

District directors, meeting in regular session June 1, faced a packed house of educators, healthcare professionals, administrative staff from colleges and healthcare institutions and program beneficiaries themselves as they were updated on the two unique programs, which together over the next three years will account for more than $7 million in district expenditures.

Sequoia Healthcare District is mid-way through a 10-year partnership with SF State University, Cañada College and Sequoia Hospital to produce a cohort of 40 nurses per year, with priority given to students living within the healthcare district. Sequoia Healthcare District funds $1 million per year for nursing student scholarships.

And, thanks to the Healthy Schools Initiative established last year to consolidate several years of community support of public school nurses and wellness programs, dozens of spinoff youth health initiatives are now up and running at elementary, middle and high school campuses throughout central and southern San Mateo County.

Nursing Education

Presenting the nursing baccalaureate update for San Francisco State University were Donald Taylor, Dean of the College of Health and Human Services; Lynette Landry, PhD, Director-Elect of the School of Nursing; Vice President for Advancement Robert Nava\; College of Health and Human Services Director of Development Mark Kelleher and two graduates, Suzanne Awad and Jeffrey Meinhold.

They were joined by Dr. Harvey Davis of the San Francisco State-Cañada College Partnership.

Dr. Landry reported that the program has graduated 272 nurses in the past four years for a 92 percent pass rate and has met or exceeded all its benchmark goals. One hundred forty-three — almost 53 percent — of graduates live and work in San Mateo County. The economic downturn has frozen nurse hiring in many places, including in many San Mateo County hospitals, she added; however, the expectation is that the pendulum will swing towards more hiring within one to two years.

Dr. Davis said the program “is working out better than we imagined,” pointing out nurses in the board meeting audience who were actually there on separate health-related matters.

The district Nursing Education Program is unique for the quality of its partners and for its rule allowing students who already hold bachelor’s degrees to enroll for a second bachelor’s in nursing. Because of capacity, financial or other limitations, many colleges will not enroll students who already hold a degree.

Registered Nurse Jeffrey Meinhold is such a one. Born in Redwood City, a graduate of local schools and a college graduate, Meinhold developed the dream of entering nursing after getting his first degree. He was denied college entrance at universities because of the degree or because of highly competitive entrance lotteries where only a few get in.

Thanks to the Healthcare District scholarship, he was able to obtain his degree last year and was the successful applicant for the position of school nurse in the Belmont-Redwood Shores School District — a position that the healthcare district’s other program, Healthy Schools, funded.

“I want to share that without this program I wouldn’t be a nurse now,” Meinhold said. “This program offered me a merit-based system allowing me to be selected. Without that, I wouldn’t be here. I have to say ‘thank you’ for the program.”

Suzanne Awad, also a 2010 graduate of the program, said her path began when she gave birth to her children at Sequoia Hospital.

“I was intrigued by the nurses who cared for me,” Awad said. “Had it not been for this program I would not be a baccalaureate-prepared nurse. My husband and I own a restaurant in Belmont. The college was only ten minutes away from my home and ten minutes away from my children’s school. I feel very fortunate to be in this program.”

Awad now works on the cardiac surveillance unit at Sequoia Hospital and says she is excited to be working with internationally known cardiac surgeons and physicians.

Healthy Schools Initiative

Updating the board on first-year progress in the district’s Healthy Schools Initiative (HSI) were luminaries from the public schools, including three district superintendents — Jan Christensen, Superintendent of the Redwood City School District; Emerita Orta-Camelleri, Superintendent of the Belmont-Redwood Shores School District and Craig Baker, Superintendent of the San Carlos School District — plus Anne Campbell, San Mateo County Superintendent of Public Instruction.

Joining them were Dr. Lesley Martin, Director of Wellness for the San Carlos School District; Maureen Campbell, Vice-principal at Woodside High School; Kimberlee Stanley, director of Woodside’s Counseling and Advocacy for Teens (CAT) program; Cherie Ho, Director of Wellness for the Belmont-Redwood City School District and Principal at Redwood Shores Elementary School; Thea Runyan, Health and Wellness Specialist for the Belmont-Redwood Shores School District; Mindy Shelton, Health Educator for the Belmont-Redwood Shores School District; Jennifer Gabet, Nutrition Education Program Manager for UC Cooperative Extension; Sebastian Castrechini, Policy Analyst for the John W. Gardner Center for Youth and Their Communities at Stanford University and school nurses Meinhold and Janette Lal.

Sequoia Healthcare District has committed at least three years and $4.5 million to helping budget-impacted school districts hire school nurses, wellness directors, physical education teachers and other staff to improve the health and healthy eating habits of more than 23,000 public school students.

Director of the Healthy Schools Initiative, Pamela Kurtzman, emphasized that activities of the program follow the Department of Public Health’s Coordinated School Health Model with the goal of filling in the gaps in health and wellness programs in the public schools.

“Budget cuts have decimated these programs,” Kurtzman said, “despite the fact that we know kids aren’t going to learn if they’re not healthy, if school staff are not healthy and they don’t have good role models in the area of health and wellness.”

Secondly, she said, because HSI is new for the district and cutting edge, data gathered by the Gardner Center at Stanford University will be critical for evaluating success, identifying areas for improvement and pointing the way for subsequent years of the program.

All agreed the program fulfills a critical need.

“To give you an example of what is at stake,” Superintendent Christensen said, “one of our nurses has charge of a medically fragile student subject to seizures who needs a shot within two minutes of a seizure or they’d die. More and more schools are dealing with problems such as diabetic children, students with mental health issues and disabled students. Without this funding, we wouldn’t provide this kind of assistance.”

Dr. John Baker, Deputy Superintendent of the Redwood City School District, reported that HSI allowed the district to hire a registered nurse, two Licensed Vocational Nurses and a physical education specialist and two counselors.

The schools are now reaching out to other community organizations such as Second Harvest Food Bank to coordinate in-home and at-school nutrition programs.

The focus on mental health is paying off, as well.

Woodside High’s Kimberlee Stanley said it allowed the school to implement an “alternative suspension program” that gives students involved in violent episodes the option of two counseling sessions, an additional session with parents and the final option of continued counseling.

The program saw 56 students in the past year and followed up client surveys. Through a random sample of 50 students the surveys disclosed that 90 percent of them felt they were coping better after counseling, 100 percent felt they had benefited by counseling and 98 percent said they’d seek help again.

Cherie Ho heads a team of healthcare workers in the Belmont-Redwood Shores School District and presented data that showed HSI has changed behavior of students and staff, top to bottom, throughout the district. Every school now has a Wellness Team that establishes priorities for its campus; Wellness Teams throughout the district are now coordinating their activities.

Belmont-Redwood Shores is reaching out to community partners such as the Belmont Police Department, Youth and Family Enrichment Services, Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital and the county Healthy Schools Task Force to bring in conflict resolution services, health challenges and teaching programs.

Dr. Lesley Westridgde of the San Carlos School District reported that her schools worked with the City/County Association of Governments on Safe Routes to School to get kids and parents safely out of cars and on their feet to school, are developing one healthy menu for all school lunch programs, are presenting weekly staff yoga classes, flu shots and AED and CPR training for every teacher in the district and more.

Policy Analyst Castrechini of the Gardner Center at Stanford said tracking the program, evaluating outcomes and following student progress ultimately will refine the model and help inform the Sequoia Healthcare District board as it makes future funding decisions.

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SEQUOIA HEALTHCARE DISTRICT DIRECTORS APPROVE $4.1 MILLION IN PUBLIC HEALTH CLINIC, NONPROFIT AGENCY FUNDING FOR 2011-12

REDWOOD CITY, 4/6/2011 — Peninsula nonprofit organizations large and small serving diverse healthcare needs of thousands of residents and major public health agencies will receive an infusion of $4.1 million in grant funds next year as the result of action by the Sequoia Healthcare District Board of Directors Wednesday, March 6.

A total $1.5 million in grants for 27 nonprofit healthcare agencies, ranging in size from $15,000 to the $100,000 maximum, was approved for the district’s Caring Community Grant program.

This funding represents about seven percent of Sequoia Healthcare District’s more than $10 million in total community support, but have an outsized impact on the district’s most vulnerable populations — homebound seniors, infants and children who would otherwise not receive healthcare, the hungry and homeless of all ages.

In addition to Caring Community grants, Sequoia Healthcare District directors extended for a fifth year $2 million in funding to support two of San Mateo County Health Service Agency’s 11 public medical and dental clinics — adult and children’s clinics at North Fair Oaks — in addition to the Ravenswood Family Health Center.

Healthcare District Board Member and ACHD Vice Chair Katie Kane applauded the grant funding. “The collaborative relationship between the clinics and the district during the past 10 years has had a profound effect on the health of uninsured people in our district,” she said.  The opening of a Breast Center demonstrates the importance of the District’s impact on the improved health of our community,” she added.

Finally, directors agreed to provide 75 percent of the funding required by the nonprofit Samaritan House to establish a formal breast center for indigents. The additional funding will help pay for a “navigator” who will shepherd patients from breast cancer diagnosis through treatment in a program that Sequoia Hospital supports with free mammograms, private physicians support with volunteer labor and county health services supports in myriad ways.

The added funding brings Sequoia Healthcare District support for Samaritan House to $612,000 this year. Total grant funds help pay for medical and dental services, housing for the homeless, food and other basic services.

Samaritan House rallied more than 6,000 hours of volunteer labor last year to provide more than 4,500 clinic visits at an average cost of $124 per visit. Because of poor economic conditions and increased unemployment, that clinic visit number is up more than 20 percent this year over last, according to Samaritan House Executive Director Kitty Lopez.

Sequoia Healthcare District Board Chair Kim Griffin said, “Sequoia Healthcare District is committed to providing preventative breast health and coordination of breast cancer care to a population that traditionally has lacked this service. Personally, I urge primary care providers to follow the lead of agencies such as Samaritan House and county health services to step up and do the same.”

Executive Director Lopez said the agency is “thrilled to have Sequoia Healthcare District’s support for a new Breast Care Clinic as part of the Samaritan House Free Clinic in Redwood City. Through a breast care ‘navigator’ we can close the gap between prevention services and health treatment for many low income uninsured women in our community.”

The Caring Community grant program is the product of a six-month review that involves representatives of the district board, community representatives and individuals. Grants are paid in two parts, with the first six-month payment to be presented to awardees at a celebration June 7.

Grantees must submit a six-month report detailing how the funds are being use and their effectiveness in meeting the objective of the grant. The second six-month payment follows. They also are required to submit a final assessment at the end of the fiscal year.

This is the 11th grant cycle for the Caring Community program, which in total as returned more than $23 million to the community.

Sequoia Healthcare District directly assists more 35,000 women, children and seniors in the district, which includes the cities of Atherton, Belmont, Menlo Park, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, Woodside, and portions of San Mateo and Foster City from Skyline Boulevard to the Bay.

Recipients of 2011-12 awards are:

Adapt Foundation ($15,000), Advocates for Accessible Recreation ($50,000), Boys and Girls Clubs of the Peninsula ($75,000), Court Appointed Special Advocates for Children ($50,000), City of San Carlos Senior Program ($25,000), Children’s Health Council ($30,000), Committee Overcoming Relationship Abuse ($100,000), Edgewood Center for Children and Families ($100,000), El Centro de Libertad ($50,000), Friends of Veterans Memorial Center ($50,000), Kainos Home and Training Center ($35,000), Lesley Senior Services ($75,000), San Mateo County Mental Health Association ($30,000), Mid-Peninsula Resident ($50,000), Mission Hospice ($35,000), National Association on Mental Illness ($20,000), Ombudsman Services ($50,000), Pathways ($60,000), Peninsula Family Services ($50,000), St. Anthony’s Padua Dining Room ($100,000), Sheriff’s Athletic League ($25,000), Second Harvest Food Bank ($100,000), Service League ($25,000), Shelter Network ($100,000), Society of St. Vincent de Paul ($25,000), Youth and Family Enrichment Services ($75,000).

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