Western Sierra Medical Clinic Wins National Health Service Corps Award of Excellence

Cradle-to-grave care is how Frank J. Lang, Family Nurse Practitioner and Executive Director of the Western Sierra Medical Clinic, describes the gamut of services his medical center offers.  A long-time partner of the National Health Service Corps, Lang, along with his wife Bette Jo, have been operating and managing the clinic for 29 years.  In fact, Frank is an original NHSC Volunteer.  Together, he, Bette Jo and 11 full-time employees serve as the only medical provider and dental provider in western Sierra County, California — an area of more than 500 square miles.

A 24-hour, seven-day a week facility, Western Sierra Medical Clinic (WSMC) provides 5,000 medical and 2,000 dental patient encounters annually, and more than 80 percent of the residents use the medical clinic as their primary source of medical care.  The clinic has served as a model for providing health care in a frontier environment, and due to the limited public health services available, WSMC provides the majority of health screenings, immunizations and health education programs.  Recently, WSMC was selected as a site visit for the National Health Policy Forum to demonstrate the model it employs.

“Our biggest value in the community is that we provide 24-hour care in an area that has no emergency medical or other medical care available.  It’s a tremendous challenge.  I feel that Western Sierra illustrates the basic concepts of what the Corps is all about, and I’m proud of that.”

More than 50 percent of the clinics patients are over the age of 55, so the team at WSMC provides substantial chronic disease management, home visits to the elderly, preventive screenings, immunizations, medication evaluations…even a hospice program.  Lang said, “We connect with people in the significant elements of their lives as they move through life with their families and parents.”

The disease management programs have been a great success.  Very few patients end up hospitalized for their chronic problems.  However, Lang contributed some of the programs’ success to the “fishbowl” environment.  “A small community allows for a little better penetration in monitoring people.”

But that’s just one sector of patients the clinic serves.  The scope of practice in an area like western Sierra County is highly evolved, independent and comprehensive. The clinic utilizes high speed internet as well as an Electronic Medical Record in addition to Telemedicine. It requires providers to be highly skilled, multi-taskers who are cross-trained in several areas.  After all, most of the clinic’s service area is national forest — an outdoor enthusiast’s and Mountain Bikers haven — so the clinic sees an abundance of tourists with orthopaedic injuries.

Staff members at WSMC provide Emergency Medical Technician training and supervision to the fire department, ambulance and rescue agencies.  Partnerships with law enforcement, schools, county government and community service and senior care organizations reflect the coordinated effort to maintain the availability of 24-hour medical care to western Sierra County.  Lang summarized, “We will continue to develop the resources necessary to maintain these services and develop an infrastructure that will ensure the availability of quality health care services in this area.”

Learn about other NHSC success stories.