Nationwide Children’s updates Mount Vernon school clinic, urges outreach to boost use

Nationwide Children’s Hospital officials gave the Mount Vernon City Schools Board an update on the district’s school-based health clinic and asked the board to help increase community awareness and student access.

Mary Gator, senior director of school health at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, and Laurie Schumann, nurse practitioner at the Mount Vernon High School School-Based Health Center, outlined services available at the clinic and said the operation has unused capacity.

The clinic provides comprehensive primary care — well visits, vaccinations, same-day acute care, sports physicals, chronic disease management and “primary care mental health,” Gator said. She said Nationwide Children’s trains nurse practitioners to diagnose and manage common mental-health conditions (anxiety, depression and ADHD) and offers telepsychiatry when specialist input is needed.

Gator said the clinic aims to be a medical home for children who lack routine care and stressed that the service is a complement to, not a replacement for, family pediatricians. “We are not trying to replace relationships that people have with their family physicians,” she said, adding that the clinic sends an after-visit summary to a child’s regular pediatrician.

Clinic utilization last school year totaled 471 visits, an average of about three visits per day during clinic hours (8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.), Gator said. She said staff would like to increase daily visits to about 12–14 and noted there is unused capacity.

Board members and staff discussed outreach strategies. Gator and Schumann described community engagement efforts already underway — attending First Friday events, open houses and meetings with Mount Vernon Nazarene University health staff — and asked the district to promote the clinic in newsletters, parent conferences and community events. Gator said Nationwide Children’s will produce testimonial videos and other marketing materials and welcomed help from district staff to identify outreach opportunities.

Board members asked about age range and transportation. Gator said the clinic can serve infants through age 22. Schumann described a pilot that used a district school bus to transport small groups of students from elementary schools to the clinic for scheduled preventive services and said the program could be expanded with scheduling and sign-ups. Both staff emphasized that transportation runs were scheduled and intended for preventive care (vaccinations and routine visits), not for same-day sick visits.

Board members raised community concerns they had heard, including rumors that students could receive care without parental notification. Gator said the clinic obtains parental permission before care and contacts parents after visits. “They go out of their way to make sure not only do they get permission prior to the visit, but after the visit, they’re contacting parents and letting them know exactly what happened,” she said.

District members offered specific outreach suggestions, including table space at school events, the weekly community newspaper and the district newsletter, and connecting with local early-childhood providers and Head Start. Gator said Nationwide Children’s staff are working with college and career center nurses to tailor outreach for older students.

Gator and Schumann asked the board to consider transportation pilots for additional elementary schools and to help publicize clinic hours and services. Board members responded positively and thanked the presenters.

The board did not take formal action on the clinic during the meeting; the presentation was an informational briefing and a request for outreach support.