by maineseacoast | Sep 13, 2019 | Island Health, Island Outreach, Maine Seacoast Mission, News, Sunbeam
The important work of telemedicine on Maine islands
By Maine Seacoast Mission • September 12, 2019
For Maine’s island residents, accessing even basic health care is a significant challenge. Trips to the mainland, when possible, are expensive and time consuming.
Since 1905, the Maine Seacoast Mission has played a vital role connecting residents of Maine’s most isolated unbridged islands with services: access to medical and dental care, spiritual support, education, and crisis services. The first of the Mission’s ships named Sunbeam, commissioned in 1912, carried books, supplies, and pastoral care to Maine islands, lighthouses, and isolated coastal communities of Hancock and Washington counties.
The Sunbeam also transported the very ill to hospitals, and provided basic health care and vaccinations.
Today, the Sunbeam V, with a Captain and four-person crew, carries on its work, combining Mission traditions with modern telemedicine.
Full story and photos
by maineseacoast | Sep 12, 2019 | Island Health, Maine Seacoast Mission, News, Sunbeam
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Dr. Kelley’s eye exam room inside Swan’s Island Public Library.
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L-R: Dr. Kurt Kelley, Sharon Daley, RN, and Librarian Jeanie Hoyle
BAR HARBOR, ME — On August 30 Dr Kurt H. Kelley, MD of Mid Coast Eye Associates, Bath, ME and Island Health Services Director Sharon Daley, RN traveled to Swan’s Island aboard the Mission’s interim boat, Moonbeam, to provide free eye exams.
Dr Kelley is able to provide screenings for glaucoma and cataracts and prescribe eye glasses. Eighteen people saw Dr. Kelly that day. Thank you, Dr. Kelley for the donation of your time and skill in providing this great service.
Also, thank you Swan’s Island Library librarian Jeanie Hoyle for letting us use the library, and also coordinating appointments and transportation.
Learn more about the Mission’s Island Health Services:
by maineseacoast | Sep 5, 2019 | Island Health, Island Outreach, Maine Seacoast Mission, News, Sunbeam
BAR HARBOR, ME — The Mission boat, Sunbeam V, is never better loved, perhaps, than when island communities gather for companionship and a meal inside the Sunbeam salon. Sunbeam Steward Jillian always has delicious food to offer. Jillian’s meals, in turn, are often enhanced by homemade dishes brought aboard the Sunbeam by islanders.
With the Sunbeam V out of the water for a routine major refit, the Sunbeam crew chose to keep alive the gatherings for conversation and food in new places among the islands.
Island Health Services Director Sharon Daley, RN this week snapped some photos this week of “Taco night at the Parsonage on Isle au Haut” really capturing the spirit of celebration.
“Good to be together,” said Sharon. “Special times and people telling wonderful stories and memories and building more.”
Learn more about the Mission’s Island Services
by maineseacoast | Aug 6, 2019 | Island Health, Island Outreach, John Zavodny, Maine Seacoast Mission, News, Sunbeam
BAR HARBOR, ME — Approximately 20 health care providers traveled to GCI on the Moonbeam and other boats to a health fair hosted by the Maine Seacoast Mission. This provided islanders a chance to have free hearing tests by an audiologist, blood sugar checks information on breast self exam, hospice, domestic violence and home health care.
There was chance to put on a survival suit in a water safety class, learn about movement and music therapy, or make a spirit doll with an art therapist.
Having a chance for providers to meet each other to collaborate and for islanders to learn about services on a beautiful island made for a special day for all.
Thank you, Cindy Thomas, Chair of the Cranberry Isles Health Committee, for these photos of Health Fair participants. These entities are also listed here with links to their respective web sites where you can learn more about them — including how to contact them. These entities are also listed here with links to their respective web sites where you can learn more about them and how to contact them.
Hospice Volunteers of Hancock County
Healthy Acadia
Mount Desert Nursing Association
OceansWide
Breast Health Center at MDI Hospital
MDI Hospital Community Health Educator Mary Parham
Next Step Domestic Violence Project
UMaine Audiology Clinic Director/Supervisor Amy E. Booth, MA, CCC-A
Acupuncture and Nutritional Wellness with Colleen Bunker LAC
Acadia Family Center with Hilary Chermak, MS, ATR-BC, LCPC, Art Therapist
Melissa Violette, MT-BC, NMT Music Therapist
by maineseacoast | Jul 29, 2019 | Island Health, Island Outreach, Maine Seacoast Mission, News, Sunbeam
Photo courtesy Portland Press Herald
pressherald.com
Health care
Updated July 28
Maine still waiting for internet health care revolution
Poor broadband and out-of-step Medicare policies relegate the state’s use of telehealth to small niches when it should be in the mainstream.
By J. Craig Anderson, Staff Writer
Information technology should be revolutionizing the way patients in Maine interact with their health care providers, but poor broadband infrastructure and outdated federal policies are slowing progress to a crawl.
Many people believe the best way to increase access to quality, affordable health care in Maine is to connect more patients and providers in real time over the internet and cellular networks via an approach known broadly as telehealth, but there are major obstacles.
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[One] program, created in 2001 by the Maine Seacoast Mission, involves a boat outfitted with telehealth equipment and staffed by nurse Sharon Daley, the mission’s director of island health. The mobile telehealth service regularly visits 10 inhabited islands east of Boothbay Harbor, including Frenchboro, Isle au Haut and Matinicus.
Daley said the program has saved island residents countless hours of costly travel for routine medical appointments.
“It costs a couple hundred dollars to go off-island,” she said. “You miss a day of work.”
Full report
