Was it inspiration or desperation that caused our involvement with CATCH-UP Oklahoma? Sometimes inspiration and desperation can merge and share a common goal. Our original plan was to find a way to keep our doors open and protect the health of our staff, volunteers and family members of the guests that come into Clarehouse. Even though our care model is outside the healthcare system, we follow strict guidelines regarding daily operations during the pandemic. From the beginning, we reached out to our trusted medical liaisons for expert guidance on how to proceed safely at Clarehouse in order to continue our care while keeping our guests, families, staff and volunteers safe. Unfortunately, we were still hit hard by COVID. For the safety of our staff and those who come into our home we had to close our doors three separate times. After the third time closing our doors, we knew there had to be a better way for our non-profit to operate and make decisions in this trying time. We began having hard conversations with many of our current and past board members and this was when we first learned about the CATCH-UP program. One of our volunteer doctors suggested exploring a program through the Public Health Institute of Oklahoma that could provide easy access to COVID tests. Since Clarehouse provides care 24/7, a local testing site would provide our staff and volunteers a safe place to make sure they are healthy and a non-risk to those around them. After looking into more information, we quickly learned that one of our past board members was the PHIO Project Director, Laura Ross-White. Laura’s commitment to the CATCH-UP program and her passion for Clarehouse inspired us to consider option of having a testing site at our house. Seeing so many people get sick with a lack of testing sites helped make our decision easier. If more people could know if they have COVID, they would be able to make more informed decisions. We knew this was another opportunity for us to get involved in the Tulsa community and make a lasting health-forward decision for those who support us and for those who need our support. We have been able to help a wide range of people since we opened the testing clinic at our house. Many people were able to get same day testing with our drive-through option, and countless others signed up from our promotional posts on our social media. We were able to regularly schedule and test our staff and volunteers, and as we spread the word about our testing site, multiple medical hospice staff members began to test weekly with us, fulfilling their desire to keep their home patients safe. Our need to find a safe testing option so we could keep our doors open, and our community’s need to have a local testing site for COVID merged and was able to be solved through a partnership with the CATCH-UP Program. We were given the opportunity to go beyond end-of life-care and begin actively attempting to protect life as well by allowing our community to have access to accurate and fast COVID test results.
One area we were able to help in a spontaneous and unexpected way was with the Tulsa Area United Way.
Clarehouse is a non-profit organization that specializes in end-of-life care. We are a community home for dying people; the first of its kind in Oklahoma. Since 2003 we have provided compassionate 24/7 comfort care to people in their last days and weeks of life. When someone reaches the last weeks of their life, their care needs increase dramatically. Often, that burden of care is too much for loved ones who are exhausted, stressed, physically unable, may have to work full time, or emotionally not equipped to handle the challenges of the final days alone. We step into that role of caregiver, which allows family the freedom to spend precious moments together, focused on what matters most to them. Not only do we try to give the best care to those who are dying, we come together to support and care for the family members of our guests who die in our home. These family members walking out of our doors are the same people in our community we were able to reach in a new way. The COVID testing clinic funded by the CATCH-UP program gave Clarehouse an extra connection with the lovely people we see every day.