For a brief moment on Wednesday this week, our Bend hospital had zero inpatients with COVID-19. It’s the first time we have hit that particular milestone since June 3 of last year. 

Although as of this morning our inpatient COVID-19 number was back up to one, it’s still a moment worth celebrating. 

We have come a very long way in our COVID-19 fight. 

At times it has felt like a never-ending battle. And while it isn’t over, I’m so very proud of our St. Charles team and our entire Central Oregon community for how we have come together to face this global pandemic. 

We have washed, we have masked and we have distanced – and will continue to do so – and these actions have undoubtedly saved lives. As our county risk levels decline and our worlds are opening back up, I have so much hope because of the most important tool in our COVID-19 fight: vaccinations. 

To date, along with our county public health and National Guard partners, we have given more than 50,000 COVID-19 vaccinations and are a leader in the state in terms of how many people we have vaccinated over the age of 65 per capita. 

While it is still too soon to draw any definitive conclusions, it appears our vaccine strategy is working. The average age of patients hospitalized at St. Charles Bend in March has declined compared with those hospitalized in January. This is a trend we hope to see continue as vaccinations become available to all Oregonians by May 1. 

My ask of you today, no matter your age or underlying health conditions, is that you pre-register for your COVID-19 vaccine. Visit centraloregoncovidvaccine.com and spend just two minutes completing the registration form. When you are eligible and we have a dose for you, we will send you a unique link to book your vaccine appointment.

Once you have pre-registered yourself, please share the link with others. Help us spread the word. If you are able, register those who don’t have access to a computer or need technical assistance. I am confident that just as we have pulled together to fight COVID-19, we will pull together as a community to ensure every eligible Central Oregonian who wants a vaccine is able to get one in the next few months. 

Thank you, as always, for your continued support. 

Sincerely,
Joe

In recent weeks, media outlets, health care organizations and others around the world have been marking the one-year anniversary of COVID-19’s unwelcome arrival into our lives.

What a year it has been.

When I think back, I cannot remember when or where I first read about this new novel coronavirus, which started in China in late 2019 and spread to the United States in January of 2020.

What I can remember is the day the first presumptive positive case of COVID-19 was confirmed in Central Oregon: March 11, 2020. I remember attending a hastily organized mid-day meeting, where the overriding mood was not one of worry or panic, but of confidence and resolve. We had been preparing for that moment for months, and we knew that while the disease was unpredictable and the future was uncertain, our health system was ready to handle it.

I also remember watching my colleague, Dr. Jeff Absalon, and other local officials speak at a press conference that afternoon. “This,” said Dr. Absalon, St. Charles’ chief physician executive,  “is what we do.”

To be clear, he was not talking about holding press conferences. He was talking about caring for people who are sick.

That is what we do here at St. Charles, every single day. It is our commitment to ourselves, our commitment to each other, our commitment to our communities and our commitment to you.

Of course, there have been tough stretches over the past year. Preparing for and responding to COVID-19 has been a massive operational undertaking for our health system. It has dealt a financial blow to our organization. It has changed the way we do just about everything, from the bedside to the board room and all points between. And it has certainly tested our frontline caregivers and our first responders.

Have there been uneasy moments? Definitely. We are human beings, after all. But again and again over the past year, I have seen our people rise to the challenge, whether that challenge is figuring out how to quadruple a hospital’s patient capacity without expanding its footprint or how to give a dying woman the birthday celebration she deserves, even in isolation. Now, they’re heavily involved — alongside Deschutes, Crook and Jefferson counties and the Oregon National Guard — in the complicated regional effort to end this pandemic by vaccinating as many people as possible as quickly as possible. And they’ve done it all during a time of unprecedented upheaval in both their professional and their personal lives.

I have said it before and I’ll say it again: I feel incredibly proud and fortunate to lead the 4,600 caregivers who make St. Charles Health System such a great place to provide and receive care. Through a year of dizzying ups and downs, they have been a steadying force every step of the way.

Sincerely,
Joe

Today, we have 17 patients at the St. Charles Bend hospital who are sick with COVID-19.

This isn’t the highest number of hospitalizations for the virus in Central Oregon, nor is it the lowest. But many of these patients have been quite sick, which is an important reminder for all of us about how important it is to continue avoiding catching or spreading COVID-19.

Case counts in all three Central Oregon counties are much lower now than they have been in recent months, but it is still absolutely critical that we continue to follow safe public health practices. Please be diligent about hand washing, masking and distancing – especially with new, more contagious variants of the virus spreading throughout the country. Vaccinations will also greatly help to reduce the incidence and severity of the virus, but access to vaccine supply remains a challenge.

To see how our St. Charles campuses throughout Central Oregon have pitched in to care for all patients throughout the pandemic, take a look at our latest video.

Vaccine news

In the latest on the vaccine front, our tri-county effort continues at the Deschutes Fair & Expo Center, where we are actively providing second doses to thousands of Central Oregonians. This morning, we opened up scheduling for 1,000 first doses to be administered Sunday, and by this afternoon, those were already completely full.

The good news is that the state has issued a new vaccine allocation plan and we will be adding new appointments to the schedule each week. Going forward, we expect Deschutes County to announce information on appointment availability on Fridays, with scheduling opening on Saturdays. To ensure you receive those announcements, we suggest connecting with the county's communication channels. And to be clear, this is a tri-county effort, so this information applies to residents of Crook and Jefferson counties as well.

I want to emphasize this: As they did today, these vaccine appointments will fill up quickly. If you miss out one week, please don't fret. More will open up in the following weeks. You'll have more chances to get an appointment. And we will repeat this process until everyone who wants a vaccine gets one.

If you are eligible to receive a vaccine, you can also check our St. Charles website for appointments at any time. If you need help registering online, refer to this video tutorial. A hotline is available for support from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday. The number to call is 541-699-5109.

In addition, the federal retail pharmacy program is now underway. While St. Charles and our partners at the county public health departments are not responsible for this program, we do encourage Central Oregonians to regularly check the following websites for appointment availability:

• Albertsons/Safeway: http://www.safeway.com/pharmacy/covid-19.html
• Costco: https://www.costco.com/covid-vaccine.html
• Healthmart: http://www.healthmartcovidvaccine.com/

Each pharmacy is only receiving about 100 doses per week at this time, so appointments are likely to fill fast.

Finally, many primary care providers are now approved by the state of Oregon as vaccine administration sites. This includes our St. Charles Family Care clinics. This week we are administering 50 first doses to eligible patients through our St. Charles Family Care clinic in Madras. The clinic staff is reaching out to eligible patients directly to set up appointments. Please do not call the clinic to request an appointment as we do not want the phone lines to be overwhelmed.

As you can see, there is a lot of effort going into making as many vaccines available as possible throughout our region. Thank you, again, for your patience, understanding and willingness to help our health system fight COVID-19.

Sincerely,
Joe

As the COVID-19 vaccine distribution process continues to evolve, it is important to me that you continue to receive accurate and up-to-date information.  

Please know that while St. Charles is helping in every way we can to distribute vaccines to our Central Oregon communities – we are partners in the process and are only one piece of a much larger puzzle.  

Vaccine distribution starts at the national level. The federal government decides how many vaccines each state will receive each week. In Oregon, we have been receiving about 100,000 doses per week of first and second doses for the entire state.  

From there, the Oregon Health Authority decides how many vaccines to send to approved vaccine distribution sites throughout the state. Those sites include county health departments, hospitals, primary care clinics, pharmacies and other health care providers who have gone through a state application process.

At the local level, we are following the state’s guidance on groups of people who are eligible to receive the vaccine. Our three Central Oregon counties were able to quickly vaccinate the majority of those in the first phases and moved ahead of the state’s schedule for a period of time. Now that we are receiving a smaller number of first doses from the state, we have had to slow down our distribution. This week, Deschutes County received only 1,200 first doses and made the decision to distribute those doses mostly to primary care providers for administration to their patients in the senior population who are eligible. Jefferson and Crook counties also received a small number of doses that they are handling through their clinics.

It remains our hope that we will receive another large allotment of vaccine so we can continue our large-scale vaccination efforts at the Deschutes County Fair & Expo Center in the coming weeks. The Oregon Health Authority is working on a new vaccine allocation plan and we expect to receive those details early next week.  

For now, the best thing you can do is register at https://vaccine.deschutes.org to be notified when you are eligible and to receive regular updates.  

We greatly appreciate your patience as we continue to do our best to vaccinate our population as quickly as possible.  

Sincerely,  

Joe

Every single person reading this, I’m sure, is ready to be done with this pandemic.

I know I am. There is light at the end of the tunnel, it’s true. At the same time, we are more than a year into a reality altered by COVID-19, and I’m tired of it. I’m sure you are, too.

As always, though, I’m looking for silver linings. And there’s been a silver lining happening at the Deschutes County Fair  & Expo Center over the past month.

That’s where, in collaboration with Deschutes County Health Services and the Oregon National Guard, we’re administering doses of COVID-19 vaccine to as many Central Oregonians as we possibly can, based on available supply and the state’s sequencing plan. We believe we’ve completed vaccinating most of the Oregon Health Authority's Phase 1A and group 1 of Phase 1B, which cover local health care workers, first responders, educators, childcare providers, corrections officers and staff at long-term care facilities, among others. Since Jan. 20, we’ve administered vaccines to more than 30,000 people, including many seniors.

And we haven’t wasted a single dose. If you’ve heard otherwise, you’ve heard a false rumor. We haven’t wasted a dose, and we will not waste a dose. 

Vaccinating thousands of people is a very good thing, of course, but that’s not necessarily the silver lining I’m talking about.

The silver lining I see at the fairgrounds is one powered by communication, coordination and collaboration. I see an organized and efficient operation stood up in days by a number of smart people who are dedicated to working tirelessly for the betterment of Central Oregon. I know it took many hours of thinking and talking and planning by folks who don’t work together regularly, but who came together to bring this vaccination site to life.

Those people built online schedules and sent out invitations to sign up. They printed and hung signs and stuck tape on the floor to ensure smooth flow. They set up a registration process and a respite room. They created a temporary pharmacy out of thin air. They recruited experienced vaccinators to administer the vaccines.

We have doctors and nurses and pharmacists and patient access pros out at the fairgrounds because they know how important this is and they want to help. We have executives volunteering to spend weekend days there, just to do whatever is needed at any given moment. We have hundreds of people from across our communities showing up to volunteer, simply because they believe it is the right thing to do.

We are not the only organization involved in this effort, of course — not by a long shot. Many local entities have played a part in this process, and if I tried to thank them all, I would inevitably miss one. So, for now, I’ll just offer up an enthusiastic “thanks!” to Deschutes County for its partnership in making the fairgrounds vaccination site a success and to the Oregon National Guard for sending troops to help out. We are fortunate to have partners who are as committed to getting this vaccine into arms and ending this pandemic as we are here at St. Charles.

All of this makes me smile. And I’m not the only one. Over and over again, as educators and others flocked to the fairgrounds in recent weeks, we heard positive feedback about the operation: Easy. Fast. Professional. Safe. “It didn’t even hurt!” Even when some folks had to wait in line out in the cold, never did we hear anyone complain. The place has been buzzing with positivity.

That’s a testament to the teams that made it happen and the time they’ve put into it. Again, I want to express my sincere gratitude to each and every one of them.

Stay safe out there.

Sincerely,
Joe

This week, I’ve got good news and bad news for you related to our ongoing COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

The good news

Thanks to an incredible effort including St. Charles, Deschutes, Crook and Jefferson counties and the Oregon National Guard, more than 31,000 people in the tri-county area have already received the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. That group includes health care workers, educators, first responders and more.

On Jan. 25, we opened up vaccinations to all Central Oregonians age 75 and older, which was ahead of the Oregon Health Authority’s sequencing schedule. We were able to do this because we had already vaccinated the vast majority of those who fall into the first phases of the plan. By doing so, we were able to make our way through a large allotment of vaccine – more than 10,000 doses last week.

The bad news

The state, which controls distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine, is not sending us more first-doses this week. Instead, OHA is redirecting most doses to health systems in the Portland area that are continuing to vaccinate those in the first phases. We are unsure when new first doses will be allocated to us, but we expect this situation could continue for the next several weeks.

This is disappointing, but we feel fortunate that we have been able to get such a great start on vaccinating our most vulnerable residents. It’s also important to remember that we’re truly all battling this pandemic together, because the virus doesn’t differentiate between Central Oregon and the Willamette Valley. It doesn’t recognize county borders or turn around rather than brave snowy mountain passes. If COVID-19 is spreading in Portland, we will be affected. We need as many people as possible vaccinated, no matter where they live.

For those of you who have received your first dose, please know that we have been assured by the state that we will receive second doses of the vaccine. Our second dose clinics will continue as planned.

When we opened up vaccines to a larger population it caused some confusion and a whole flood of questions coming our way last week. In the first 24 hours, we received more than 2,500 voicemail messages on our COVID-19 vaccine scheduling hotline and it took a team of people several days to get through them. We apologize to those of you who had to wait for answers, but we are pleased to say that all those who called either received their vaccine or were contacted with more information thanks to an incredible team effort. 

While I know navigating the system has been difficult for some, we have also been overwhelmed with positive messages from those who have received their vaccine. You can watch one of our 91-year-old patients in this video and hear first-hand about the experience.  

Many thanks to those of you who took the time to write and share your feelings about receiving your first dose. It is heart-warming to hear these stories and know that all this very hard work is making a difference in our COVID-19 fight.  

Sincerely,

Joe

Jan. 22, 2021

The local COVID-19 vaccination effort is well underway. We are ahead of schedule and are excited to announce the latest in vaccination news.

St. Charles has been working hard with our public health partners to vaccinate everyone in the state’s Phase 1a group. I am pleased to say that as of Thursday morning we received approval from the state of Oregon to move from Phase 1a to Group 1 of Phase 1b in Deschutes County. (If you are in Phase 1a and have not yet received a vaccine, please know that you can still be vaccinated.)

Here is a graphic that explains the phases: 

This means we are actively vaccinating our K-12 and early learning educators along with childcare providers. Our goal is to administer all of the vaccine we have on hand at our large-scale vaccination events at the Deschutes County Fair and Expo Center this weekend. And we are actively working to schedule more vaccine appointments for this group next week.

For a sneak peek into what it’s like to go through the vaccination process at the fairgrounds, please watch this video.

Once Group 1 of Phase 1b is complete, we will again ask for the state of Oregon’s permission to move to Group 2 of Phase 1b, which includes those who are 80 years and older. We will then continue to move through vaccinating the different groups depending on vaccine supply.

At this time, the best way for you to know if you are eligible to receive the vaccine is to visit the Deschutes County website and register. Once you enter your information, the county will send you an email when you are eligible with details on how to schedule your appointment. For information in Jefferson and Crook counties, please visit their websites: www.JeffCo.net/PublicHealth or www.co.crook.or.us/health.

The large-scale vaccine events at the fairgrounds simply wouldn’t be possible without hundreds of people – including many volunteers. It’s been awesome to see the collaboration and community spirit that have brought organizations and people together to make this a success. We’ve received donations of snacks, water and coffee from grocery stores to help keep the team going strong through some very long days.

We are going to be vaccinating people for many months to come and we appreciate all the support to keep the momentum going. Thank you.

A word about Redmond

Unfortunately, we released news this week of a COVID-19 outbreak at our St. Charles Redmond hospital. We are certainly not the first hospital to face this difficult situation as we fight this pandemic, but we do want to reassure you that we are doing everything in our power to control and contain the spread of the virus and to ensure our patients’ and caregivers’ safety.

This type of thing isn’t anybody’s fault. I want you to know that everyone in our organization is working hard to maintain a safe environment, and as an organization we continue to learn and adjust in an effort to improve our safety.

If you have questions or concerns about this situation, please refer to these frequently asked questions, which we will update as our investigation progresses. More than anything, it is important to know that there is no known risk of exposure to people who visited the hospital prior to Jan. 5, 2021, people who visited for outpatient treatment or people who visited a St. Charles clinic. Our staff is actively calling all patients who may have been exposed and giving them instructions on how to isolate and monitor themselves for symptoms. Those calls should be completed today.

In addition, many have asked if the caregivers who tested positive for COVID-19 had been vaccinated. I want to be clear that while some of them had received a first dose of the vaccine, they were not fully vaccinated with two doses. The timing of this outbreak does not in any way reflect on the efficacy of the vaccine – which is shown to be about 95% effective two weeks after the second dose.

We strongly believe the vaccine is an important tool in our fight against COVID-19 and encourage all those who are interested to receive it as soon as they are eligible and supply is available.

This situation highlights that while we are actively working hard to vaccinate our community, the pandemic is not over. A new, more contagious variant of the virus has been identified in Oregon and we must double down on our safety efforts. Although we are all tired of hearing it and saying it, washing our hands regularly, wearing a mask when in public and physically distancing from others should remain our top priority.

Thank you, again, for your support of our team throughout this difficult time.

Sincerely,
Joe

Our phones have been ringing off the hook this week as so many of you have questions about when and how you will be able to get the COVID-19 vaccine.

I'm inspired that Central Oregonians are ready and willing to be vaccinated in the hopes of ending this terrible pandemic. My ask of you today is to stay calm and patient. We are actively working on a plan to ensure every Central Oregonian who wants the vaccine will have the opportunity to be fully vaccinated. 

Information related to the supply of vaccine has shifted considerably throughout the week. The situation continues to be dynamic and evolving, but I want to share what we know as of today.

Before I do that, though, I want to reiterate to you that the best way to keep yourself and your loved ones safe is to continue diligently doing the things we've been asking you to do for almost a year:

• Wash your hands frequently
• Stay home as much as possible, especially if you are not feeling well 
• If you must go out, wear a mask that covers your nose and mouth
• Stay at least 6 feet away from people who aren't in your household bubble

With record COVID-19 case numbers, new strains of the virus spreading, cold weather that encourages indoor gatherings and uncertainty around the vaccines, it remains vitally important that you do everything you can to protect yourself.

Vaccinations in Central Oregon

Our team is working tirelessly alongside our local public health partners to stand up large-scale vaccination events in the coming weeks. But these events will be dependent on the availability of vaccine that we receive from the state.

As of today, St. Charles has vaccinated more than 5,000 people who fall into the Phase 1a group under the state’s current guidance. This includes frontline health care workers, EMS providers, law enforcement officers, long-term care facility residents and staff and some educators who work directly with children with special needs. We are making good progress, but we know we have a long way to go.

Our goal is to get the COVID-19 vaccine into as many arms as we can – as quickly and safely as possible. Quite honestly, our hospitals continue to be full. Our caregivers are exhausted from fighting this fight every day. Widespread vaccinations are critical to setting us on a path to a more normal future.

Starting next week, we will move our remaining Phase 1a vaccinations to the Deschutes County Fair and Expo Center in Redmond, which will help prepare us for future large-scale vaccination events. We will provide an update on our large-scale vaccination effort – including who is eligible and how to schedule an appointment – as soon as we know we have the available vaccine. 

Here is the latest on vaccine eligibility from the state of Oregon: 

• Vaccination of the 1a group—including health care providers, first responders, long-term care facility residents and staff and those with intellectual disabilities—continues. It is the only group eligible for vaccination at this time. If you fall into this group, please visit our registration page and, if you meet the criteria, we will contact you to schedule an appointment.
• Starting the week of Jan. 25 (and in some counties, sooner), childcare providers, early learning and K-12 educators and staff will be eligible for vaccination
• Starting the week of Feb. 8, vaccinations will open to individuals 80 years and older
• Following the 80 and older group, seniors in three age bands will also become eligible in the following order (the dates to be announced):
  • Seniors 75 and older
  • Seniors 70 and older
  • Seniors 65 and older

Our partners in Jefferson and Crook counties are also working hard to vaccinate their Phase 1a group members. They too hope to offer large-scale vaccination events once they have a reliable supply of vaccine. For more information we encourage you to visit their websites at www.JeffCo.net/PublicHealth or www.co.crook.or.us/health. 

For those of you who may be feeling hesitant to receive the vaccine, I encourage you to watch this informative Doc Talks presentation by Dr. Cynthia Maree, our infectious disease medical director. The evidence shows overwhelmingly that the vaccines are safe and effective.

Please be patient with us as we continue to work on our vaccination roll-out and know that we will proactively share information when it is available. We encourage those of you with questions to call the COVID-19 hotline at 541-699-5109, which is staffed Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturdays. Please do not call our clinics and hospitals with vaccine questions. Allow our staff to focus on the important work of taking care of our current patients. 

You can be confident that we will be successful in vaccinating every resident in Central Oregon who wants to be vaccinated. We got this!

Sincerely,
Joe

When people think about St. Charles Health System, most think about hospitals, clinics, doctors and nurses. And with good reason! Taking care of Central Oregonians is what we do here, every single day.

But there are many ways to take care of Central Oregonians that don’t involve a visit to one of our facilities.

For example, did you know St. Charles has a Community Benefit program that funds services and organizations working to improve the health of the local population, with a special focus on the disadvantaged and the medically underserved?

Every three years, St. Charles — through the Community Benefit department — conducts a Community Health Needs Assessment for each of the four regions served by our hospitals. The resulting report helps guide the selection of a three-year priority for the program.

From 2017 to 2019, Community Benefit’s priority was suicide prevention. In that same timespan, we provided 143 suicide prevention trainings (including 11 in Spanish) to more than 2,500 people and implemented the reliable and valid Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale in our clinics.

We can’t tackle suicide prevention alone, of course, which is why we also awarded more than $240,000 in funding to regional organizations that are doing this important work.

That work will continue to be important, and you can be sure St. Charles will remain engaged in regional suicide prevention efforts. At the same time, we have selected a new strategic priority to guide our Community Benefit program through 2022: alcohol misuse prevention.

In a region where the production and consumption of alcohol is a prominent part of our social lives and our economy, prioritizing the prevention of its misuse may seem like a tough row to hoe. But that’s exactly why our health system’s leadership believes this is a major health need in Central Oregon. Our chief physician executive, Dr. Jeff Absalon, explains:

“Alcohol misuse is a root cause of many chronic health and societal problems — liver disease, fetal alcohol syndrome, child abuse, domestic violence and the cause of many auto accidents that damage lives. If we can reduce binge drinking, increase identification and interventions for alcoholism, and ensure that the norm for community gatherings that include alcohol is to drink responsibly, then Central Oregon will be healthier and safer.”

So, for this three-year period, St. Charles will work to develop innovative ways to improve access to alcohol-related care, increase educational opportunities and awareness, and reduce the negative impacts associated with alcohol misuse to the health of our communities. We’ll also provide grant funding to local organizations working on this issue, just as we did with suicide prevention.

Alcohol misuse prevention grants will be awarded quarterly, and applications are now being accepted. You can learn more here.

We have three other Community Benefit grants available, too: one for those providing basic needs such as shelter, food or safety; sponsorships for community events and/or fundraisers; and small grants for those seeking $500 or less. Again, you can learn more here.

Throughout 2020, we rightfully celebrated the caregivers who are risking their own health on the front lines of the battle against COVID-19. And we should continue to celebrate them.

But as the calendar turns to a new year, I just want to take a moment to highlight our Community Benefit program, too.

It may not wear scrubs, gloves and a mask, but it is an integral component of our goal here at St. Charles to create America’s healthiest community, together.

Sincerely,
Joe

Each year, when the holidays roll around, I like to begin reflecting on the year that will soon come to an end.

This year, that reflection will happen in the massive shadow of COVID-19.

For most of us, it’s been a long, hard year for a lot of reasons. That’s true at St. Charles, too, where planning for and responding to the pandemic has taxed our caregivers, from the front lines of patient care to the administrative and support departments that help keep the health system running as smoothly as possible.

COVID-19 has changed the way we do our work. It has rewritten our policies and procedures and forced many of our people to work from home. It made us plan for the unthinkable in ways we couldn’t have envisioned just a year ago. It took a bite out of us financially.

And it is not done.

But behind the scenes, the silver linings shine brightly. Throughout the first half of the year, I was blown away by our caregivers’ openness to change, even when it came quickly and without warning. Day after day, our teams adapted to rapidly evolving circumstances, often putting in late nights and/or extra hours to do so.

Faced with shortages of masks, gowns and other protective equipment, our caregivers scoured the global supply chain for more, and our community hand-sewed and donated over 10,000 masks to us when we needed them most. Faced with concerns about our ability to care for a surge of COVID-19 patients, our caregivers quickly assessed our facilities and our workforce and built a plan to expand our capacity if needed.

With those issues addressed, we were able to get back to the business of caring for our communities. In 2020 alone:

We improved access to care in Prineville by expanding and upgrading the Family Care clinic and outpatient rehab facility there, and opening a new Immediate Care clinic.

We started offering virtual visits (via video, phone or electronic message) at many of our clinics, allowing patients to see their provider safely and in the comfort of their own home.

We opened the new Short Stay Unit in Bend, a state-of-the-art recovery space that will shorten wait times, increase safety and improve patient flow at the busy hospital.

We earned a spot on the 2020 Healthcare Equality Index as a “Top Performer” in promoting health care equality for our LGBTQ+ community and continued expanding our outreach to the local Spanish-speaking population.

We partnered with Portland’s Oregon Health & Science University to create what is believed to be the first graduate medical education program in Central Oregon, with residents based in Madras.

We continued our commitment to playing an active role in the communities we serve by providing health education, support for those who need it, scholarships for students and events that put the “fun” in fundraising.

We revived our efforts to envision the future of our Redmond hospital campus and to give it a more defined role within our health system so that it can fulfill its tremendous potential.

We identified our next priority focus for St. Charles’ community benefit efforts - prevention of the misuse of alcohol - which will drive some of our partnerships and education work in the coming years.

We were named one of the nation’s “Most Wired” health care organizations for our use of technology to help analyze health data and achieve meaningful clinical outcomes.

And finally, we redoubled our efforts to give back to the community and support local businesses after we received so much support during the early days of our COVID-19 response.

I can assure you, that’s just a portion of the amazing things that happened at St. Charles in 2020, even in the face of a global pandemic. And I hope it gives you an idea of why I am so proud to lead this organization and its 4,500 caregivers - now more than ever.

Around here, “creating America’s healthiest community, together” isn’t just a vision statement. It’s what we do every day.

Thank you for being a part of it.

Sincerely,
Joe