South Carolina AHEC News & Updates

The following is an account written by Joseph Hoyle, MD, MPH, PGY-2 at the McLeod Family Medicine Residency Program and co-author John Schwartz, MS As a family medicine resident, I have the opportunity to care for the poor and underinsured within a supervised environment.   I learn to complete the insurance paperwork, disability evaluations, electronic documentation, and refill requests usually handled by other members of an outpatient practice team.   Also, at McLeod I work in an efficient, quality-driven inpatient system.   It is no surprise why many of my resident colleagues choose hospital medicine. Yet, I am planning a career in person-centered outpatient care.   Because of a trial experience of integrated behavioral care with a psychology graduate student from Francis Marion University, I have a renewed vision for what this career could be. Over the course of approximately four months, I had available collaboration – by text or phone call – with an in-house behavior

The 35 th  Annual South Carolina School Nurse Conference will be January 22-23 at the Embassy Suites at the Charleston Area Convention Center in North Charleston.  This year’s theme is “Somewhere Over the Rainbow: Believe It, Achieve It”.   Over 400 school nurses are expected to attend from across South Carolina to celebrate school nursing and improve the ability to protect and promote the health, safety, and wellbeing of school children in the state.  The conference is approved for eight total contact hours of nursing credit and includes presentations on ethics, leadership in school nursing and orientation, school nurse challenges, seizures, emergency care, concussions, self-harming behaviors, common skin conditions and the benefits of laughter with children.  Various vendors will also be in attendance.  For more information and to register, please visit: www.lcahec.com .

Pee Dee AHEC recently completed year one as a recipient of a National AHEC Organization (NAO) grant to conduct HPV (Human Papillomavirus) immunization education. This is the first of a potential five-year grant supporting this education.   The purpose of the grant is to disseminate education to providers on the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommendations for immunization practices in the prevention of HPV. The CDC has broadened its recommendations from 11- and 12-year-old girls to the addition of males in this age group, as well as males and females ages 13-26 who did not receive the immunizations at a younger age or did not complete the three dose series. In addition, they have added recommendations for any male through age 26 who engages in sex with other men and for men with compromised immune systems (including HIV) through age 26 if they did not receive the HPV vaccine when they were younger. During the first year of the grant, health profes

Lowcountry AHEC will be offering a CNOR (Certified Nurse Operating Room) Prep Course on March 19-20 at Trident Medical Center in North Charleston.   This two-day seminar is a broad, comprehensive review of preoperative, intraoperative and postoperative considerations for the surgical patient. This course will prepare perioperative nurses to take the CNOR exam and to demonstrate clinical competence and knowledge of practice standards.   This continuing nursing education activity will provide 16.0 instructional hours.   Registration is open until March 11. Please go to www.lcahec.com for additional information and to register.

Pee Dee AHEC Health Careers Academy (HCA) students channeled the spirit of the season in December and volunteered to spread the holiday cheer. These future healthcare professionals worked together to give stuffed Christmas stockings to children in the McLeod Children’s Hospital. The students were responsible for purchasing stocking stuffers suitable for male and female patients between infancy and 18 years of age. Emily Gaskins, an HCA sophomore said, “This is a form of helping those kids emotionally, which is a part of health.” “Giving and wrapping gifts and stockings for the children in the hospital is a really amazing thing because I want to help kids one day as a pediatric nurse practitioner,” said Megha Patel, an HCA junior. Using empathy, team building, and leadership skills the students stuffed gifts like bubbles, fuzzy socks, cars, dolls, and balls into 20 stockings. More than a dozen other gifts too large for a stocking were wrapped. Meredith Strickland, an HCA ju