multnomah county

Health Departments See Reduced Demand For Vaccinations

While high exemption rates remain a concern, officials believe more families are receiving vaccines in primary care settings rather than at county clinics before school starts

August 21, 2013 – Getting kids ready for school means getting them vaccinated – and county health departments throughout the Portland metro area are hosting walk-in clinics and supporting schools and primary health providers to make certain they have stores of vaccines.

By:

Christen McCurdy

Culturally Appropriate Care Vital to CCO’s Success

Lillian Shirley, the director of Multnomah County’s Public Health Department, believes it’s critical to understand where a patient is coming from

November 20, 2012 -- Oregon’s new coordinated care organizations should make important public health goals such as reducing diabetes and obesity top priorities, but they must realize that culturally appropriate care is essential if their messages are to be heard, a top public health official told The Lund Report.

By:

Miriam Widman

First Permanent Safety Net Dental Clinic in Downtown Portland Opens Friday to Serve Most Vulnerable

November 8, 2012 -- Multnomah County will open the first permanent safety net dental clinic in downtown Portland on Friday, Nov. 9, 2012. The new clinic is located on the third floor of the new Central City Concern building at 33 N.W. Broadway.

The Billi Odegaard clinic is expected to serve up to 1,500 clients a year, many of them people who are homeless or among the most vulnerable in our community.

Billi Odegaard is a retired public health nurse and Health Department director who believed in community partnerships to stretch every dollar.

By:

Multnomah County

Activists Push to Halt Coal Exports, Coal Burning

Local health, environmental and clean energy groups participate in a screening to hear about the struggles of activists in the Coal River Valley of West Virginia

November 8, 2012 -- The fight to keep coal trains from passing through Oregon on their way to ports overseas was put in a national context at a free screening of the documentary, The Last Mountain, at Portland's Bagdad Theater last week.

By:

Christen McCurdy

Multnomah County to Assess Potential Impact of Coal Dust

County and city officials have asked for an assessment to investigate the health ramifications of transporting coal through the area

September 27, 2012 -- Following calls by neighborhood activists as well as members of the medical community, Multnomah County Health Department staff have been asked to conduct a health impact assessment investigating the likely health effects of coal trains traveling through the area on their way to ports of Portland and Seattle, from which they would then be shipped to China.

By:

Christen McCurdy

Funding Worries Loom as Hooper Center Celebrates 40th Anniversary

In particular, the county-funded CHIERS van, which takes intoxicated people to Hooper to sober up, has reduced its hours and may run out of money before the end of the year

September 12, 2012 -- In the early 1970s, anywhere between 400 and 500 chronically homeless people – most men, most addicted to alcohol or opiates – called the streets of inner Northwest Portland home. They cycled in and out of the jail system, arrested again and again on charges of public inebriation.

Then public drunkenness was decriminalized in Portland along with many other cities, according to Ed Blackburn, executive director of Central City Concern.

By:

Christen McCurdy

City Club Report Critical of County’s Mental Health System

It recommends that the county turn over mental health services to a regional entity by working with the Oregon Health Authority

March 31, 2011 -- The City Club of Portland released an in-depth report of Multnomah County’s mental health system today which concluded that the county’s mental health system, which served nearly 30,000 people in 2009, is not patient-centered and is egregiously flawed.

By:

Amanda Waldroupe