Summerton receives AARP Community Challenge Grant to run “Cross My Heart Free Mobile Clinic"

The Town of Summerton is thrilled to announce we have been selected to receive a 2021 AARP Community Challenge grant. The town is one of only 233 grantees selected from across all 50 states, Washington D.C., Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

 
With this “quick action” grant, students will design, build, and staff a mobile clinic that will bring healthcare to residents’ doors. The 'Cross My Heart Free Mobile Clinic' will be led by a Nurse Practitioner and staffed by a rotation of student nurses from Midlands Technical College, Central Carolina Technical College (CCTC) and University of South Carolina College
of Nursing.

 
“We are incredibly excited to support the Town of Summerton as they work to bring improved
access to health services for the town’s residents. The Cross My Heart Free Mobile Clinic is a
promising idea we hope will jumpstart long-term change,” said Teresa Arnold, AARP South
Carolina State Director. “Our goal at AARP South Carolina is to support the efforts of our
communities to be great places for people of all backgrounds, ages and abilities to live, work, retire and enjoy their lives.”

 
The various partners of this initiative will provide primary healthcare services to rural Clarendon County residents who have limited or no access to medical services, which will help improve the overall health and wellness of the people of Summerton. With a population of approximately 1,000 residents, the Cross My Heart Free Mobile Clinic will offer citizens much needed access to a wide variety of health services.

 

The mobile clinic will offer a very effective way to help reach patients who forgo preventative care because they can’t afford it. “The Town of Summerton is extremely proud that AARP selected us to receive this grant,” stated Cedric Liqueur, Development Director for the Town of Summerton. “AARP is a nationwide leader making neighborhoods, towns, and cities more livable for all residents and we are honored that they see the tangible value this project will bring to our community.”

 

 

Christianity and the Spirit and Practice of Healing

Introduction

As shown in the following table, healing is one of the central themes of the gospels presented in the New Testament of the Bible. During his ministry, Jesus healed lepers, blind men, the lame, a hemorrhaging woman, the demon-possessed, and even raised the dead.

In the book of Acts, Jesus involved his disciples in the work of healing. That book contains a number of accounts of healing by Christ's followers. The epistles of Paul also discuss healing as a gift of the Holy Spirit. 

 

New Testament Verses in the Gospels about Healing

Jesus Heals a Leper Matthew 8:1-4; Mark 1:40-45; Luke 5:12-16 Jesus Heals a Roman Officer’s Servant Matthew 8:5-13; Luke 7:1-10 Jesus Heals Peter’s Mother-In-Law Matthew 8:14-15; Jesus Heals the Many Matthew 8:15-16; Luke 4:38-39 Jesus Heals Two Men Matthew 8:28-32; Mark 5:1-20; Luke 8:26-39 Jesus Heals a Paralyzed Man Matthew 9:1-8; Mark 2:1-12; Luke 5:17-26 Jesus Heals a Woman Who Touched His Cloak Matthew 9:20-22; Luke 8:43-48 Jesus Heals the Officials Daughter Matthew 9:18-26; Mark 5:21-43; Luke 8:40-56 Jesus Heals Two Blind Men Matthew 9:27-31 Jesus Heals a Dumb Man Matthew 9:32-33

Jesus Heals Many People Matthew 9:35   The Healing Mission Matthew 10:7-8; Luke 9:1-6   Jesus Heals the Man with the Paralyzed Hand Matthew 12:9-14; Mark 3:1-6; Luke 6:6-11   Jesus Heals a Crowd Matthew 12:15-16   Jesus Heals a Blind and Dumb Man Matthew 12:22; Luke 11:14   Jesus Heals a Woman’s Daughter Matthew 15:21-28; Mark 7:24-30   Jesus Heals Large Crowds Matthew 15:30-31   Jesus Heals an Epileptic Boy Matthew 17:15-18; Luke 9:38-43   Jesus Heals Two Blind Men at Jericho Matthew 20:29-34; Mark 10:46-52; Luke 18:35-43

Background

During the early years of Christianity, physical healing was an integral component of Christian life and faith reflecting God's message of love, compassion, and care. In the 4th century, influenced primarily by Western theologians, Christians began to regard illness as a punishment from God. Over the centuries, spiritual versus physical health increasingly became separate or compartmentalized.

During the Dark Ages and subsequent centuries, an attitude toward faith as an intellectual rather than experiential exercise, further diminished the ministry of healing in the church. By the mid-19th century, people began to reaffirm the relationships between faith and healing. Today, a more holistic, integrated view of health has emerged and many of the faithful have become involved in the Christian ministry of healing. For more detail on the History of Christianity and Healing, go to Encyclopedia.com

Definitions The term spiritual healing is often used to refer to healing solely through spiritual means, rather than through any physical or psychological methods. Spiritual healing often means reliance upon meditation instead of medication, aspiration rather than medication, turning to God and relying on the Holy Spirit and the power of prayer. Modern medicine involves the application of the most effective treatment to diagnose, treat, and care for patients seeking medical help… based on the biomedical sciences, medical research, new surgical techniques, and a variety of other tested therapies, medical technologies, and pharmaceutical solutions. Combine the two approaches to healing and amazing things can happen!

Conclusions & Recommendations

Christian spiritual healing is often seen as healing through faith, prayer, spiritual disciplines, and the dominance of spiritual values in one’s quest for wholeness. However, most Christians also understand that healing is not limited to spiritual methods alone. Spiritual methods often rely on the overlapping use of the physical and psychological methods of healing used in modern medicine.

Christians should absolutely continue to believe in spiritual healing, praying for those who are physically sick, but they should also take advantage of modern medicine and procedures... viewing them as gifts from God. Christians ought to not only avail ourselves of the best modern medicine has to offer, but we should simultaneously pray for the effectiveness of the latest medical treatments, while giving thanks for them.

I resurfaced this article I had previously written because it seems very appropriate as millions struggle today with the decision whether to get vaccinated against COVID-19 during these trying times. Feel free to add your constructive comments.

Summerton Primary Care Clinic Closing

Unfortunately, the Summerton Primary Care clinic run by Nurse Practitioner Dale Barwick is closing down as of December 20, 2019. The clinic has struggled to survive and turn a profit over the past three years, but finally lost the battle. This leaves the town without a healthcare clinic once again.  

If you would like to continue to be cared by Dale Barwick, she will begin seeing patients in Sumter as of January 20,2020. She is joining Colonial Healthcare which has offices in Sumter and Manning. Call 803-773-5227 if you would like to receive care at one of the Colonial Healthcare facilities.

A  letter providing more detail has been sent out to all Summerton Primary Care patients.

Summerton SC Annual Health Fair - October 5, 2019

The annual Summerton SC Health Fair will take place October 5, 2019, in the Clarendon School District #1 Community Resource Center Gym at 1154 Fourth Street - from 10am to 1pm. All Clarendon County residents are welcome.

Some of the many sponsors of this event include CVS Pharmacy, Summerton Primary Care, Lake Marion Artisans, Hope Health, Walmart Vision Center and many others.

Free flu shots for Medicare patients, free screening for blood sugar levels and blood pressure, free vision tests and more are being offered. Hope to see you there. 

Keep our local community healthy and secure!

Summerton Primary Care Clinic in its 3rd Year

Dale Barwick, Certified Nurse Practitioner, established Summerton Primary Care a couple of years ago back in June 2017. It is located at 123 N. Main Street in downtown Summerton. Many potential patients have driven by it for several years and have yet to stop and go in there.
 
When the Clarendon Hospital closed the only clinic a few years ago, like many I was forced to look for a primary care provider somewhere out of town. I was not happy about that, but looked for a new source of care in nearby Manning.
 
Several years passed and I was just not happy with my primary care physician in Manning. So, I finally stopped and went into the Summerton Primary Care clinic to check it out. I was impressed. It looked very professional looking and the staff were friendly and courteous. After answering my many questions, I went ahead and made an appointment to meet with Dale Barwick MSN, the Nurse Practitioner.
 
I made an appointment to come in 2 weeks later for an initial consultation. In the meantime I did some research, looking up Dale Barwick's credentials, educational background, and work experience. I also checked out the clinics Facebook page and web site.
 
Barwick received her undergraduate degree from Clemson University and Master of Nursing degree from the University of South Carolina. She has worked as a nurse practitioner since 1990, starting in Kershaw County before moving on to Sumter and Clarendon Counties.
 
Despite some limitations on services it provides, the Summerton Primary Care has been well received by local residents and is still growing. Because of limited advertising, many of her new patients have heard about Dale Barwick and the Summerton Primary Care clinic by word of mouth.
 
Dale Barwick MSN is supervised by Dr. Andy Reynolds, a physician in Sumter. She and her practice are affiliated with several hospitals including McLeod Health Clarendon and the Tuomey Healthcare System in Sumter.
 
For more information about the Summerton Primary Care clinic, you can call (803) 488-8888 or you can go online and visit their Facebook Page. I know I have already made arrangements to move my electronic medical records and care from Manning to the clinic in Summerton. 
 

* Check out a related article on the Summerton Primary Care Clinic published in The Item back in 2017 when they first opened.

Summerton SC Health Fair: Community Strives for Better Health

Summerton, SC, was abuzz Saturday morning as approximately 150 local residents attended the Summerton Health Fair in the Clarendon One Community Resource Center on Fourth Street. More than 20 organizations participated in the event sponsored by the Lake Marion Artisans Art Gallery by providing free screenings, services and information to anyone interested in health and well being.

The brainchild of two gallery members, Nancy Foster and Marlise Guillerault, the Summerton Health Fair was a service that Summerton needed. Both organizers said they’d been wanting to coordinate a health fair for some time. Guillerault said it was relatively easy to procure support from the community for the event when she explained the reasons. 
Foster said, “We were overwhelmed by the people and organizations who called to participate or to donate.” Among the numerous financial supporters are First Citizens Bank in Summerton, Bank of Clarendon, Agape Hospice, Short Trip Convenience Stores, Goat Island Restaurant and so many others.

Various businesses, organizations and individuals not only provided financial support, they also provided support by setting up booths, providing literature and information, giving away promotional materials and screening local attendees for things like vision, diabetes, blood pressure and cholesterol. Participants included Hope Health, the American Red Cross, Clarendon County Fire Department, Clarendon Women’s Shelter, Clemson Extension, McLeod Clarendon Hospital, Walmart Vision Center and Summerton Primary Care, Short Trip Convenience Stores - amongst nearly 20 others.

Kathleen Gibson, site coordinator for the Clarendon One Community Resource Center, was instrumental in procuring the facility and all sorts of additional assistance for the event. Gibson said, “People were extremely receptive and eager to participate.”

As attendees stood in lines to get screened or to garner information and products, Clarendon County Council Chairman Dwight Stewart looked about the venue and said that this event was extremely important for all the citizens of Summerton—especially because of the poverty in the area and the difficulty of transportation for some residents. Stewart said, “Two health issues that particularly affect this and other areas like Summerton are blood pressure and diabetes.” He said he was pleased to see free screenings provided at the health fair for those medical concerns.

Hope Health was a major player at Saturday’s event by providing free blood pressure, diabetes and cholesterol screenings. Diane Davis, Community Outreach Coordinator for Hope Health, said, “I’ve been doing this for over 4 years, and this is one of the busiest health fairs I’ve seen.” At that point in the morning, she said Hope Health had completed over 60 screenings.

Many people found the event convenient because of their busy lives and jobs and were able to attend because it was planned for a Saturday instead of a weekday. Susie Murry said she was pleased that she could get her blood pressure checked. Ella Johnson said, “I enjoyed the health fair, and the fire safety information was helpful.” Pleased that she could get cholesterol and diabetes screenings, Ann Robinson said, “I’m looking forward to next year’s event.”

After the screenings many attendees enjoyed the free snacks, fruit and bottled water available, thanks to the donations of supporters. St. Matthias Church even baked homemade muffins for the event. In addition to providing the venue, Clarendon District One Schools provided lunch from Subway for the organizations providing the free services for the health fair. 

Written and submitted by VickiWilkerson, 

Local Summerton-based author of The Summerbrook Series of Southern Novels.

Update on Artificial Intelligence and Healthcare

The sheer volume of available medical knowledge has long since outstripped even the most capable clinician's ability to review and properly analyze the all the data now being generated and collected about a patient's health. Today it requires the assistance of sophisticated computer systems to not only help them with the analysis of the data, but to also stay on top of breakthroughs in genomics, predictive analytics, clinical decision support, population health management, and the continuous changes in best practices. Read How Healthcare Can Prep for Artificial Intelligence.

Even the best, most attentive health care providers simply can’t stay on top of all the data and the growing body of ever-changing medical knowledge. Doctors just can't be there for a patient around the clock, to catch every bad habit or reinforce every positive behavior. However, Artificial intelligence (AI) has evolved to the point that it can now begin to significantly augment the healthcare provided by physicians, pharmacists, nurses, and health coaches – not to mention self care.

Today, over 90 Artificial Intelligence (AI) startup comanies are already active in developing new solutions in the areas of Imaging & Diagnostics, Drug Discovery, Remote Patient Monitoring, Hospital Management, Customer Service, Healthcare Analytics & Research, Patient Alerts & Reminders, Telemedicine, Public Health, and more. See Artificial Intelligence Startups in Healthcare by CB Insights.

Selected Quotes In a recent interview, AthenaHealth CEO Jonathan Bush noted the limitations of traditional doctors and said, “The human is wrong so freaking often, it’s a massacre.” “By 2025, AI systems could be involved in everything from population health management, to digital avatars capable of answering specific patient queries.” — Frost & Sullivan. Stephen Hawking has said the development of full Artificial Intelligence (AI) could spell the end of the human race – and Elon Musk agreed.

Current Examples of AI in Healthcare

Aside from the big players like IBM and Google, some of the other major startup companies focused on AI in healthcare include: Ayasdi, Babylon Health, Digital Reasoning, Gauss Surgical, H2O AI, iCarbonX, Lumiata, Pathway Genomics, Stratified Medical, Welltok and Zephyr Health – to name just a few.

The following are specific examples of major AI systems and project activities in healthcare that you might want to explore further:

• Google Deepmind Health project is being used to mine the data of electronic medical records (EMR) in order to provide better and faster health services. 
• Medical Sieve, an ambitious long-term exploratory project by IBM is being used to build a next generation “cognitive assistant” with analytical, reasoning capabilities and a wide range of clinical knowledge to assist in clinical decision making in radiology and cardiology. 
• IBM has also launched Watson for Oncology that is able to provide clinicians with better evidence-based treatment options.  
• Babylon Health has launched an app this year which offers medical AI consultation based on personal medical history and common medical knowledge. 
• Medical start-up SenseLy uses AI and machine learning to support patients with chronic conditions in-between doctor’s visits using Molly, the world's first virtual nurse.
• Deep Genomics aims at identifying patterns in huge data sets of genetic information and medical records, looking for mutations and linkages to disease. 
• Human Longevity offers patients complete genome sequencing coupled with full body scan and very detailed medical check-up to help spot cancer or vascular diseases in their very early stage.  
• Baidu has introduced an artificial intelligence-powered chatbot called Melody to connect with patients, field medical questions, and suggest diagnoses to doctors. It is a new feature of the Baidu Doctor app it launched last year. 
• Mount Sinai Health System has tapped CloudMedx to help pinpoint people at risk of congestive heart failure as part of its emerging program dubbed HealthPromise.  
• The Computerized Patient Record System (CPRS) developed and implemented by the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) contains a number of modules that use first generation AI capabilities, e.g. Clinical Alerts, Clinical Reminders. 
• Open AI is a non-profit AI research company that aims to collaboratively develop and promote carefully an open source AI platform and software to benefit humanity as a whole. 
• VA Collaborating with Flow Health to Bring AI and Precision Medicine to Veterans. Flow Health has formed a five-year partnership with the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to build a medical knowledge graph with deep learning to inform medical decision-making and train artificial intelligence (AI) to personalize care plans.

AI Market & Financial Investment

According to a recent 2016 report by Frost & Sullivan, use of AI is growing in healthcare, with the market poised to reach $6 billion by 2021, up from $600 million in 2014. Cognitive solutions such as IBM’s Watson system are capable of sifting through huge volumes of data and providing guidance and decision support to healthcare providers, thereby improving work flow and patient care.

IBM is serious about bringing Watson into the healthcare industry. To build Watson’s medical credibility, IBM has spent $4 billion dollars purchasing companies that had huge stores of medical data, from billing records to MRI images. Read IBM's Watson Recommends Same Treatment as Doctors in 99% of Cancer Cases.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) coupled with the Internet of Things (IoT) could be the answer to solve major healthcare challenges that the world is facing today. IoT can helping care to move from hospital to home in low acuity and post-operative scenarios, with wearable sensors being monitored and analyzed continuously in real time by AI systems. The number of connected IoT healthcare devices is estimated to be $2.5 trillion by 2025. For more detail, read IoT and AI: Potent combo redefining healthcare.

Key Issues

Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology already exists, and is being deployed in many other arenas, such as finance and business intelligence. But in health care, there’s a human and psychological barrier: can we trust AI with our health?

Some of the key issues that need to be addressed over the coming decade before Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems are widely deployed include:

• Ethics - This emerging issue is concerned with the moral behavior being programmed by humans into robots and other 'smart' AI systems, e.g. Roboethics.
• Privacy & Security – When AI systems are turned loose to monitor health information systems gathering data on all facets of your personal health, concerns about who has access to the data and who it is being shared with are just a few of the issues that must be adequately addressed upfront.
• Jobs - The Bank of England has predicted that intelligent machines might take over 80 million American and 15 million British jobs, respectively over the next 10 to 20 years. The healthcare industry will not be immune to this change.
• Legal Issues - One of the most important points of interest that needs to be hammered out first is the legality of these machines. When a doctor's gross negligence leads to a misdiagnoses and patient harm, the fault is placed squarely on the shoulders of the offending physician. What happens if an AI system were to misdiagnose a patient? Who's to blame?
• Open Source - Many new 'open source' tools are arriving that can now run on affordable hardware and allow individuals and small organizations to perform prodigious data crunching and predictive tasks. Read about H2O, OpenAI, and other machine learning and AI tools being used in healthcare at Open Health News.

Conclusions & Next Steps

When and how artificial intelligence (AI) systems will stand in for doctors, nurses, therapists, or specialists is yet to be determined. The use of AI systems is already fairly prolific in some other industries. But the consensus is that these systems aren’t yet sophisticated enough for use in healthcare. However, expect all major electronic health record (EHR) systems of the future to include an AI platform within their architectural structure.

At this stage, AI is perceived as one of a group of emerging technologies that will increasingly be used to augment human capabilities. However, within 10 years AI coupled with IoT, Blockchain technology, and 'Big Data' Analytics may actually be used to carry out many of the functions currently being performed by clinicians. Read Making Us Better At The Things We Do Best.

As we continue to move forward with further development and deployment of AI systems, the following are some of the next steps that need to be taken:

• Ethical rules and standards to be incorporated in AI systems used in the healthcare need to be extensively addressed.
• The health IT industry needs to take careful, incremental steps when developing and implementing AI systems in healthcare over the next decade to avoid causing any harm.
• Medical professionals need to become much more knowledgable about AI technology and systems and work closely with developers before we move forward much further.
• Patients need to get accustomed to interacting with AI systems, discovering the potential benefits to themselves – to trust these new systems.
• Companies developing AI healthcare solutions need to carefully communicate with the general public about the potential advantages and risks associated with the use of AI in medicine.
• Healthcare oversight institutions need to carefully measure the success, shortcomings, and effectiveness of AI systems before they are widely deployed over the coming decades.

The next few decades are going to be an exciting time in healthcare. You might want to take a few minutes to read Searching for Godot – Health 4.0 by 2040.

Selected Links American Association for Artificial Intelligence Artificial Intelligence News Artificial Intelligence Journal Journal of Artificial Intelligence (AI) Research OpenAI Project Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society White House Report: Preparing for the Future of Artificial Intelligence YouTube Video: Machine Intelligence Makes Human Morals More Important Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence