Technology Brings Health to Bay Area Teens

Kids Can’t Wait in Flint

The children of Flint, Michigan are facing a public health crisis from lead contamination in the water they have been unwittingly drinking. Thousands of

kids there are now at risk for severe health problems and developmental delays. As this story unfolded, through the support of long time partners Sanofi North America Foundation and Morgan Stanley employees, Children’s Health Fund responded by deploying one of its mobile medical clinics from New York to Flint where it is providing urgent on-the-ground health care services. United States Senator Debbie Stabenow, Flint Mayor Karen Weaver, Children’s Health Fund President and Co-Founder Dr. Irwin Redlener and Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha—the pediatrician responsible for raising the alarm about the Flint lead contamination—were on hand to welcome the doctor’s office on wheels in February. “This mobile pediatric clinic will be a valuable tool in making sure children in Flint affected by this lead crisis can get the care and treatment that they need and deserve,” Mayor Weaver said. “We appreciate this resource and those who thought enough of our children to send it.”

“Things are going even better than planned,” says Dr. Seth Ammerman, the medical director of our program in the San Francisco Bay Area, as he proudly admires the

state-of-the-art mobile clinic that Children’s Health Fund delivered to his team last fall.

The new Teen Van, as it’s called by patients and staff alike, is one of the newest in the Children’s Health Fund fleet—and it’s by far the most technologically advanced pediatric mobile clinic in America. That’s thanks to a generous gift from Samsung Electronics North America, which has partnered with Children’s Health Fund to create the Samsung Innovation Center with the goal of pioneering new ways to use technology to increase access to care for disadvantaged kids.

A community project of the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford and the Children’s Health Fund, with support from Samsung Electronics North America, the van provides free medical and mental

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Children’s Health Fund is working with local partners in Michigan to provide lead screening testing and health education to Flint families.

Dr. Seth Ammerman examines his patient, Grace Kim, on the new, state-of-the-art Teen Van serving disadvantaged teens in the San Francisco area.

A word from the President

health services, including reproductive health care and treatment for chronic illnesses, substance abuse and depres-sion, as well as nutrition education. All medications are free and provided at the time of consultation. A social worker available for counseling sometimes connects patients to outside resources. And a registered dietitian works with teens who are malnourished, which is a frequent health issue for this population.

“On the van, Samsung smart tablets let us pull up infomatics and use mirror-ing technology to engage our patients with their health issues and treatments. And that helps with adherence to their medication, which is really important,” says Dr. Ammerman. “And we’re looking forward to implementing telemedicine soon, which will greatly expand the access to specialists we can provide.”

Red Nose Day is May 26Get ready for some serious fun! Red Nose Day is a global movement and live TV special telethon on NBC this May 26 and Children’s Health Fund is honored to again be one of the US charities to benefit. Red Noses are on sale now at Walgreen’s and the Children’s Health Fund Detroit project has been featured in their promotional efforts. So Laugh. Give. Save a Kid. Be a part of Red Nose Day.

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When the shocking news broke about the lead

contamination of Flint’s water supply, it sparked national outrage. And now we know that the situation in Flint just opened the door on what has since become a national story. From elementary schools in Newark, New Jersey to rural Maine and Navajo Country, Arizona, vulnerable children in low-in-come areas are drinking water that is highly toxic with lead.

The reasons are many. Public infrastructure has been long neglected in many parts of the country where lead pipes are historically in place. And in regions with decades-old housing stock, both aging pipes and peeling lead paint contribute to dangerous exposure for children living in poverty.

This health threat is severe because lead is a poison that is highly and irreversibly neuro-toxic for children during periods of rapid brain growth. Children who have high lead levels in their blood may have brain damage, and lower IQ, learning disabilities, hyperactivity, impaired speech and hearing damage.

That is why Children’s Health Fund has included lead on our list of critical “health barriers to learning” that require laser-like focus to prevent and mitigate. The children who are suffering from lead exposure are often already facing the adversities of poverty. They have a steep climb to a successful life, and it is our obligation as a society to offer them as much support as possible.

Access to quality healthcare and nutritious food, good schools and parent education can all help to turn around the impact of lead exposure for these kids. This is what we owe the children of Flint, as well as other communities where adults have paid too little attention to the dangers of lead.

In the meantime, it is critical to be sure that lead exposure from contaminated water is eliminated immediately and definitively. That’s why, in a recent Washington Post article, I suggested that if the community cannot ensure safe water for young children in Flint, families at continued risk should be given the opportunity and support to relocate until repairs are made to the damaged water infrastructure.

More exposure is the last thing these children need. Everything possible must be done to stop the ongoing damage and mitigate that which has already occurred.

Irwin Redlener, MDPRESIDENT & CO-FOUNDER

HEALTH FACT:Lead in blood is associated with lower IQ scores, higher rates of failure to graduate from high school, reading disabilities and greater absenteeism.

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Dennis Walto being introduced at the Children’s Health Fund Fall Reception at 21 Club in New York City, November 2015.

Dennis Walto Comes Home to Children’s Health Fund

Dennis Walto, the new Executive Director of Children’s Health Fund, shares his vision of the challenges

and opportunities ahead

While you’ve just assumed this new position, you actually have a long connection with Children’s Health Fund, is that right?

Very true! I worked for Children’s Health Fund more than 25 years ago, and I am overwhelmed by its growth over the past decades and the impact it has had. I worked with Dr. Redlener to develop the Children’s Health Fund “National Network,” as the organization expanded from New York to include Newark, Dallas, West Virginia and Mississippi; it was an exciting time. We were also developing projects in Southern Florida, Washington, DC and Los Angeles, which have each become thriving programs. After I left Children’s Health Fund, I stayed in touch and came back to run the 1998 caravan that delivered mobile clinics to Mississippi and Arkansas. That trip was launched at the Today Show in Times Square and made stops along the way in Philadelphia, Washington, DC, and other cities along the route to highlight the need to improve health care access for kids.

So this is something of a homecoming for you. What have you done in the interim?

For almost two decades I was living and working overseas as part of international relief and development efforts responding to children in crisis in places like Burundi, Ethiopia, Jordan, Lesotho, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen. Along the way my work evolved from being a front-line relief worker to an Associate Vice President and Africa Director with Save the Children – where I was in charge of 13 Country Offices and a $140 million budget. In 2012, my family and I moved to the Washington, DC area and I joined International Medical Corps as the VP for Program Innovation & Performance.

One in five kids in America lives in poverty – and that needle hasn’t moved in many years. What does this situation mean for America?

I think the complex and interrelated reasons that trap generations in poverty are becoming increasingly clear and, as a result, we need to look at the solutions more broadly. For example, lack of access to quality health care is proven to have a negative effect on the academic success of kids in poverty. So our efforts now include identifying and eliminating “health barriers to learning” – which recognizes the interdependence of health and education outcomes.

“Not unlike a mobile medical clinic needs fuel, Children’s Health Fund needs support and partnerships to keep us moving.”

What do you mean by “health barriers to learning?”

That is a term that Dr. Redlener coined, which clusters highly prevalent health conditions that many children have that can impede learning. Our medical team has identified “six-plus-one” of these critical health areas that evidence shows can get in the way of optimal learning. The areas are vision, hearing, oral health, hunger, asthma

control, and behavioral health. The “plus-one” refers to lead screening for kids, which is usually complete by age 6, so it drops off from yearly testing. But as we have learned recently in Flint, Newark and other American communities, we have to remain vigilant about lead.

So how can we ensure kids are healthy and ready to learn?

The health barriers CHF has identified are all treatable and manageable; it will just take focus. If you provide glasses for a child, but that third grader still has uncontrolled asthma, you haven’t solved the problem. But we believe we can have an accelerator effect if we focus on eliminating these barriers as a collective group. Yearly screening and intensive case management of any issues identified will go a long way to ensuring children have a fair shot at success in school. We have to ensure that we can scale that impact – not by ourselves of course, but by identifying funding that can be utilized to identify, treat and manage these health barriers to learning

It sounds like a big challenge. Key to the success of Children’s Health

Fund in the past, and into the future, will be our dedicated supporters and many partners – we literally cannot do our work without them! Not unlike a mobile medical clinic needs fuel, Children’s Health Fund needs support and partnerships to keep us moving. It’s a big challenge – but we’ve never backed down before and I know we can help kids even more with more support!

With a three-year grant from Chubb Charitable Foundation, our Phoenix, AZ project will implement a vision screening and glasses distribution program—helping ensure that as many as 596 disadvantaged

children per year are healthy and ready to learn. Our South Bronx Health Center offers Healthy Pregnancy Groups and Well Baby Groups to provide under-resourced moms with intensive health and nutritional

information and the tools needed to build parenting skills and enduring support networks. New funding from the Dammann Fund and the William J. and Dorothy K. O’Neil Foundation expands the South Bronx Health Center’s capacity to offer group care to every family that wants to participate. CVS Health is supporting our Microwave Chef program for women and children living at a domestic violence shelter where our mobile medical clinics provide ongoing health care services. Microwave Chef engages families in conversations about nutrition, and using our Microwave Chef cookbook funded by the Walmart Foundation, walks them through healthy recipes. The goal is for the families to create a healthy eating environment in the shelter and eventually in their permanent homes.

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Kids Can’t Wait in Flint

Technology Brings Health to Teens

Q&A With Our New Executive Director

THANKS TO OUR PARTNERS

Health educator Cara Stephenson-Hunter, MS (second from left) leads a class in healthy cooking with women from the South Bronx community.