The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, recently awarded two Community Health Quality Recognition awards to The Wright Center for Community Health, affirming its efforts to advance quality care in the region and connect its patients to enabling services.

The badge recognizes the organization’s efforts in the areas of telehealth, patient engagement and interoperability, the latter of which refers to its ability to exchange data and information with other health care-related organizations and/or state and federal agencies.

The newly introduced Addressing Social Risk Factors to Health badge recognizes “health centers that are administering standardized screening tools to collect social risk factor data and increasing enabling services offered across consecutive years,” according to HRSA.

The Wright Center uses a screening tool at its primary care practices to help identify patients who might be coping with adverse social and economic determinants of health, such as food insecurity, homelessness and poverty. The organization’s community health workers and other members of its care team can then talk with a patient and offer various forms of assistance tailored to meet the individual’s short- and long-term needs, including transportation assistance, nutritious food, legal aid, educational opportunities and connections to social service agencies.

The Wright Center provides safety-net, comprehensive primary and preventive health services – including medical, dental, behavioral health, addiction and recovery, and infectious disease services – that cover the lifespan from pediatrics to geriatrics. A special emphasis is placed on medically underserved populations, and no patient is turned away due to an inability to pay.

The Wright Center for Community Health, along with Luzerne County Community College, The Institute, the Northeast Pennsylvania Area Health Education Center and the Wayne Pike Workforce Alliance have joined together to reduce the stigma associated with substance use disorder by connecting people in recovery with recovery-friendly employers in the new community-based, recovery-to-work program, Project PROGRESS.

Project PROGRESS is an acronym for Providing Recovery Opportunities for Growth, Education and Sustainable Success, which serves Northeast Pennsylvania counties, including Lackawanna, Luzerne, Pike, Susquehanna, Wayne and Wyoming.

Project PROGRESS is funded in part through a grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission along with financial support from the five partner organizations. “The goal of the project is to reduce the impact of stigma related to recovery on employees, employers and the region. Often people connect recovery and substance use, which is true, but think bigger. Recovery is about coming into healthy ways of being. The impact of being in recovery is incredible and demonstrates hard work. Whole communities benefit when people are in recovery,” said Meaghan Ruddy, Ph.D., senior vice president of Academic Affairs, Enterprise Assessment and Advancement, and Chief Research and Development Officer for The Wright Center for Community Health. 

In November 2020, Gov. Tom Wolf renewed for the 12th time his declaration that the opioid epidemic has placed Pennsylvania in a state health emergency. From 2015 to 2018, 1,149 people are reported to have died from opioid overdoses in the project’s six-county service area, according to OverdoseFreePA.

The role of a CRS is to build a strong and unique rapport with the individual in recovery based on their own lived experiences with substance use disorder. The CRS will help navigate, advocate and support individuals through their recovery journey. A CRS works to facilitate positive change and instill hope by modeling stable recovery and sharing strategies for success. 

The first CRS cohort graduated in January with 11 graduates. A second cohort with 17 graduates completed their program in late April, bringing the total number of certified recovery specialists to 28. The program includes 66 in-class hours along with 12 hours of work to be completed outside of class. The training is designed to prepare individuals for work in the behavioral health field. Upon successful completion of the class, participants move on to the application process with the Pennsylvania Certification Board.

Northeast Pennsylvania Area Health Education Center, a member of Project PROGRESS, offers training to become a community health worker. This 80-hour program is accredited through the Pennsylvania Certification Board and is designed to provide the core competencies needed for work in community-based and inpatient settings. 

Wayne Pike Workforce Alliance, also a member of Project PROGRESS, offers a recovery-to-work program that seeks to develop a strong recovery-to-work ecosystem. The Wayne Pike Workforce Alliance is focused on short-term training for immediate outcomes and employability. It uses the Comprehensive Adult Student Assessment System testing and interest assessments to ensure educational success to determine the best fit. 

For more information about Project PROGRESS, please go to ProjectPROGRESSnepa.org or email info@ProjectPROGRESSnepa.org or call 570-591-5136.

The Wright Center for Community Health is now administering the recently approved COVID-19 vaccine boosters that target the original strain of the coronavirus and the two omicron subvariants currently responsible for spreading the most illness.

Federal health officials last week authorized use of the new shots, called bivalent vaccines. They also are known simply as “updated boosters.”

These protectors – the first redesigned coronavirus vaccines to be released in America since the initial rollout in late 2020 – are intended to help contain a possible surge of new cases this fall and winter. Vaccines have proven to be the most powerful tool against the highly contagious virus, with demonstrated effectiveness during the pandemic in reducing severe illness, hospitalization and death.

The Wright Center for Community Health, headquartered in Scranton, is a Federally Qualified Health Center Look-Alike that currently operates eight primary care practices in Lackawanna, Luzerne and Wayne counties.

The Wright Center provides comprehensive primary and preventive health services – including medical, dental, behavioral health, addiction and recovery, and infectious disease services – that cover the lifespan from pediatrics to geriatrics. The Wright Center serves the community, with a special emphasis on medically underserved populations. No patient is turned away due to an inability to pay.

Learn more about The Wright Center’s mission and integrated health care services by calling 570-230-0019 or visiting TheWrightCenter.org.

Flu vaccines are now available to patients at The Wright Center for Community Health’s network of community health centers in Northeast Pennsylvania. Most individuals are encouraged to receive a flu shot before Halloween to help minimize the seasonal resurgence of the virus this fall and winter.

Vaccines developed for the 2022-23 flu season – including higher-dose vaccines recommended for older adults – are in stock at all of The Wright Center’s primary care practices in Lackawanna, Luzerne and Wayne counties. To schedule an office visit that includes the flu vaccination, call 570.230.0019 or go online to TheWrightCenter.org and use the express scheduling system.

It is recommended that everyone ages 6 months and older, with few exceptions, receive the flu vaccine, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Flu vaccines are approved by federal health officials and made widely available at health centers, doctors’ offices, pharmacies and certain other locations to encourage widespread participation by people who want to protect themselves and others in their community, including young children, senior citizens and other high-risk populations.

Individuals in a high-risk category who experience flu-like symptoms are urged to call a health care provider right away. Prompt treatment with a flu antiviral medication can often prevent serious complications.

All available flu vaccines in the U.S. for the 2022-23 season are the quadrivalent variety, meaning they are designed to protect against four different flu viruses. 

Talk with your primary care physician or another trusted health care provider if you have questions about the flu vaccine. The clinical team at The Wright Center is available to provide fact-based advice and proven strategies for coping with the seasonal respiratory virus and other issues that affect health and wellness.

Learn more about The Wright Center’s mission and integrated health care services by visiting TheWrightCenter.org.

The Wright Center for Community Health has named Danielle Sholcosky, MSW, LCSW, CPRP, of Dickson City as director of Behavioral Health Integration and Therapist Services. Sholcosky has worked as a licensed clinical social worker for The Wright Center for Community Health since 2021. 

Sholcosky received her Master of Social Work degree from Marywood University and a Bachelor of Arts in liberal studies with a minor in human development and family studies from Penn State University. She has also earned several continuing education certificates, including Eye Movement, Desensitization and Reprocessing Basic Training from The ClearPath Training Center; Mental Illness and Substance Abuse from Drexel University College of Medicine; and Certified Psychiatric Rehabilitation Practitioner from the Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association. 

The Wright Center for Community Health assists medically underserved rural and urban communities and vulnerable populations, including people who are underinsured and uninsured. With a sliding-fee discount available, The Wright Center reduces barriers to care by ensuring health care is affordable for everyone in need, regardless of their ability to pay. Overall, the Wright Center provides full-service, family-friendly community health practices that cover the lifespan, from pediatrics to geriatrics.

Its integrated services offer patients the convenience of going to a single location to access medical, dental, behavioral health, addiction and recovery services, and other supportive service lines.

The Wright Center’s network of clinics in Northeast Pennsylvania primarily serves patients from Lackawanna, Luzerne, Susquehanna, Wayne and Wyoming counties. Go to TheWrightCenter.org to use the express online scheduling system or call 570-230-0019 to make an appointment.

Artist Matt Willey of The Good of the Hive painted the mural, ‘The Bees’ Struggle to Survive,’ at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh, North Carolina. The Wright Center for Community Health is sponsoring one of his trademark murals in downtown Scranton.

The Wright Center for Patient & Community Engagement is bringing “The Good of the Hive,” a global mural project by artist Matt Willey that raises awareness about the importance of pollinators, to downtown Scranton as part of Scranton Tomorrow’s Mural Arts Program. The month-long project is scheduled to begin the week of Tuesday, Aug. 30.

The academic sponsor, Lackawanna College, will also host a lecture by the artist on Friday, Oct. 14 at 6 p.m. at the institution’s theater, 501 Vine St., Scranton. Seating for the free event is on a first-come, first-served basis.

The mural, on the side of the Civic Ballet Theater Building, 234 Mifflin Ave., will bring the artist closer to his personal commitment of hand-painting 50,000 honeybees — the number of bees in a healthy, thriving hive — in murals around the world. The completed mural will be unveiled on Friday, Nov. 4 at 5:30 p.m. during a special reception. Light fare will be served during the program.

Willey’s mission is to ignite curiosity and active engagement around planetary health issues through art, bees and storytelling. His vision is a world filled with people that see and experience the beauty and connectedness of all things. “The hive I’m creating is a metaphor for us all: No matter your color, nationality, religion, gender, age or economic status. This piece of art is an idealized picture of health to focus on as we work toward solutions,” he said. 

The worldwide mural project demonstrates perseverance in the face of adversity. Six years into an estimated 20-year project, Willey has created 35 murals and installations with more than 8,600 hand-painted bees. He has reached hundreds of thousands of people and created large-scale works at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo in Washington D.C., Dag Hammarskjold Plaza in New York City and Burt’s Bees Global Headquarters in Durham, North Carolina. 

The artist has collaborated with the World Council of Peoples for the United Nations (WCPUN) and New York City’s Art in the Parks Public Art Program. He has painted his murals at schools across the country and in the United Kingdom. In October of 2021, his art was displayed at the American Embassy in Beijing, China. 

The Wright Center for Patient & Community Engagement’s mission is to improve the health and welfare of the community through education, advocacy and patient-centered services and efforts directed toward the social and economic determinants of health. Its 18-member board, comprised of Wright Center for Community Health patients and area professionals, helps the region’s less fortunate, including those experiencing homelessness, poverty, food insecurity, social isolation and other hardships. 

For more information about The Wright Centers for Patient & Community Engagement, go to TheWrightCenter.org.