Clinic to offer online appointments, telehealth services

Augustana Dean of Students Wes Brooks updates the campus on the new health clinic opening Aug. 31, the college partnership with Genesis Health, and telehealth services.

Students who use the new clinic will be able to schedule an appointment online, reducing the need to gather in a waiting room.

The clinic will be located in Baldur House just behind the Gerber Center, next to Casa Latina.

It will be staffed by a physician’s assistant. Hours will be 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday-Friday and 9 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday.

Dr.  Brooks also explains how Student Counseling will use online counseling and a new service called Talk Now.

Transcript

Greetings from Augustana College. 

I wanted to provide an update on the new health clinic that will be starting this fall semester. 

The Augustana Convenient Care Clinic powered by Genesis will be available to all students at no additional cost, as the college is committed to paying for the first year of services through the college budget. Future funding options are still being considered. 

The clinic will be staffed and open six days a week with hours compatible with student schedules. In addition to typical convenient care clinic services that you can imagine, such as the treatment of sprains, strains, cold and flu treatment, pneumonia, minor fractures, lacerations and other acute problems, plus strep throat testing and seasonal flu vaccines, the clinic will be also prepared to care for COVID-19 patients. 

While the college is paying for services this year, medication and additional testing may drive costs for additional individual student insurance to be billed. 

With the Augustana Convenient Care Clinic set to open during the COVID pandemic, I wanted to share some different aspects of the approach the clinic will take to reduce the risk of transmission. For example, students will be able to make appointments online and receive a time, versus sitting in the waiting room waiting for their time to be seen. 

All students that receive care in the health clinic on campus will also have access to their medical records through the Genesis Health portal. 

A great feature that will allow us to continue physical distancing as much as possible on campus, is the opportunity for students to participate in virtual telehealth visits through the clinic. In addition, Genesis screening protocols will include all COVID symptoms and will follow CDC recommendations and will be updated as CDC guidance continues to improve. 

All patients and staff will be screened for respiratory symptoms and have their temperatures checked before entering the clinic. Also, all patients will be required to wear a face mask throughout their visit to the clinic. 

There is a partnership that's established between Genesis and all of the emergency rooms that Genesis cares for. That will help us to ensure that the health clinic's providing all the services necessary for our student body. 

In addition to those key features with the health care clinic, we'd also like to talk about mental health services on campus. We're excited to share that we will be providing telecounseling services this year in addition to the student counseling services that we have typically always offered. 

Students will have the opportunity for 24/7 telehealth services through a feature called Talk Now. That is unlimited, and in addition to that, students will also have the opportunity to schedule six virtual telecounseling appointments in addition to any standard counseling services that will be offered by the college. 

By offering features such as the new health clinic and also telecounseling services, we believe that puts us in position to continue offering opportunities for us to resume live classes this fall. By doing these sorts of things, including the masking, physical distancing, and the health clinic and telecounseling services, that's what makes us Augustana Strong.