Newtown’s Helping Hands—

New Kevin’s Community Center Office

Is Professional, Not Institutional

By John Voket

When Kevin’s Community Center (KCC) opened for Newtown residents about a year-and-a-half ago, founder Dr Z. Michael Taweh was satisfied that its quarters, tucked behind Health District offices at Canaan House, would suffice until the operation eventually established its own facility. Since the clinic’s relocation to commercial office space on Peck’s Lane, however, employees and volunteers for the no-cost public health provider may want to settle in for a while.

According to the center’s Director of Operations, Jennifer Galante, LPN, the new facility it shares with building, planning, health, and school board staffers recently moved from the Fairfield Hills campus offers almost everything a medical provider could want in a new office building.

“It looks like a real doctor’s office,” Ms Galante told The Bee as she took a break from settling in at the new location last weekend. “The old site was very institutional looking. It was dark, and patients had to walk through other offices to get here. Now we’ve got a professional-looking office with our own entrance and waiting room that will provide a level of access and privacy we never had at Canaan House.”

And if the steadily increasing number of new patients continues to arrive as they have in recent months, Ms Galante believes the word about KCC’s accessibility and privacy will get around, helping to encourage even more Newtown residents to consult with the center’s professionals.

Dr Taweh, who founded the clinic in memory of his late son, said in 2004 about every other patient seen at KCC was a newcomer. The clinic provides on-site health care and referrals to uninsured and underinsured individuals who cannot qualify for state supported care, such as the HUSKY program for children.

The operation is based on a successful model that was launched by AmeriCares in Norwalk ten years ago. The AmeriCares Free Clinic network has since expanded to Bridgeport and Danbury, but Dr Taweh thinks the smaller KCC model will serve as a prototype for smaller communities looking to provide health care access to residents in these days of ballooning premiums and employers shifting more of the financial burden for health coverage onto employees.

Looking back, Dr Taweh recalled that the startup was the most challenging step.

“Soon after Kevin passed away, about eight people gathered many times planning a way to start a free clinic in Newtown in the name of my son,” Dr Taweh said. “It took almost a year of planning, and a presentation to the state to establish that there was enough of a need in Newtown for such an operation.”

While the clinic was in its inception phases, volunteers split the responsibility of fulfilling all the requirements to qualify for state health department licensing, with others concentrating their efforts to secure a federal 501(c)(3) or nonprofit status.

And all this came from a physician who has no background in public health.

“I am an internist and family practitioner,” Dr Taweh said. “But having a clinic like this — we have 67 volunteers all working different shifts, and a 21-volunteer board — I have had to become a public health administrator in addition to playing doctor.”

Doctor Taweh leaned heavily on his volunteers in KCC’s first year of operation, and they delivered. Besides the week-to-week operation of the clinic, dedicated volunteers planned and presented the organization’s first major fundraiser, a gala last October that helped raise significant community support.

Proceeds raised from the gala have already helped clinic staff obtain necessary equipment and supplies to keep the operation going. Since it opened, Dr Taweh cannot recall ever having to delay or turn away a potential patient because of a lack of supplies, or outside professional support.

He and his professional volunteers have spread the word about KCC’s success, and Dr Taweh has networked with dozens of other regional professionals and support services to ensure every client gets the best care possible, no matter what their ailment.

“We are very fortunate to have people from within and outside the community volunteer to help us move this effort along,” Dr Taweh said. “Our hopes are to have other similar free clinics like this open in other towns. This is unfortunately becoming more critical as we face this national health care crisis that we have found ourselves in.”

Dr Taweh continues to be amazed at the level of need there is for health care right here in his hometown.

“We have about 1,200 families or 3,500 individuals in Newtown who have qualified for services,” he said. “This tells you about the magnitude of the problem we face. And many of these patients are being treated for chronic medical conditions including diabetes, cancer, heart disease, and the like.”

In order to provide more critical care, 50 specialists from the greater Danbury area provide free referral care to patients.

“We provide virtually all the specialties including surgery, neurological medicine, and cancer care. In addition we have Danbury Hospital providing lab services, and Housatonic Valley Radiology Associates providing radiological services at no cost,” he said.

While 90 percent of the medication KCC professionals prescribe comes from stock samples, the Drug Center in Newtown also provides medication at cost for Dr Taweh’s patients.

As the volunteers and staff prepared for state health department inspectors to come and certify their new offices earlier this week, Ms Galante ticked off a half dozen benefits the new facility afforded.

“Before, we were all sharing one small sink and one central supply cabinet. Now we’ve got a couple of sinks and supply cabinets in every exam room,” she said. “Now we won’t have to leave a patient alone to go down the hall for supplies, it’s all right there.”

Ms Galante said her fellow staffers and volunteers even took their old phone system for granted.

“We all used to share one cordless phone, so we constantly were running around taking turns. Now we’ve got a multiline system and phones in every room — we can even transfer calls that come in!”

And if there are any professionals in the area who would like to get involved as volunteers, KCC is currently looking to add another OB/GYN physician and at least one psychiatrist, she said. Potential volunteers are encouraged to call coordinator Carol Amaral at 426-6038.

Kevin’s Community Center is open every Wednesday from 1 to 5 pm. Residents interested in visiting the clinic are asked to arrive by noon on Wednesdays to fill out the necessary paperwork before they are seen. Visit Kevin’s Community Center online at www.kevinscommunitycenter.org.