According to Guy Boulton of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, October 26th, 2016, “As the state’s rural population ages, increasing its need for health care, Wisconsin is facing a shortage of physicians in rural areas that is projected to get much worse in coming decades.”
This is where Kailee Kofal, Clinic Administrator for the past six years would disagree. This Spooner grad and daughter of Gary Dunsmoor attended the UW Eau Claire to pursue a career in accounting, but after attending a class titled Introduction to Health Care Administration, she knew she had found her calling.
Now she goes to work each day in a new state-of-the-art building that was recently constructed costing $12.5 million dollars.
Essentia Health has been caring for 8,500 plus residents in the Spooner area for more than two decades and their new facility is located adjacent to the new hospital on this new medical campus on Chandler Drive. The hospital opened its doors this last May and in September the clinic (a separately owned business) joined the hospital through an indoor walkway.
(The interesting thing about the street being named Chandler is that it’s the name of the original town of Spooner. When (Spooner) was first established, it was in this same area as the medical campus is now. The town people struggled with ‘bad water’ for years and finally decided to move the entire town south to where it currently is. They moved houses and all and for some reason dropped the original town’s name of Chandler to honor John Coit Spooner, a lawyer turned US Senator from Wisconsin who was born in 1843 and served in congress from 1885 until 1891.)
Not only is the new setting a beautiful place with its rolling hills and woods, but there are smart improvements that add to a patient’s privacy and comfort.
Take the new wheelchair weight scale. No longer does a patient have to be helped out of their chair and then held while their weight is taken, now the chair and patient are simply wheeled onto a pad and it’s done.
There are individual weigh scales in all the new exam rooms making it less intimidating than the old scale that had been located in a very public hallway.
There are new high/low exam tables that can be raised or lowered for the convenience of both patients and doctors.
All of the room lights are on timers, adding to the energy efficiency of the building and even though the clinic seems much larger, it’s the same amount of square footage as before, but this time there are no exam rooms or sleep study lab rooms downstairs, now they’re all on one level.
As you’re sitting in the waiting room you can have a cup of coffee or tea and as you look around you’ll see cameras just about everywhere. “They used to be only in the parking lot, but now we have increased our security coverage throughout the building.” Now too, all employees wear badges that are coded to the doors so only they can enter.
Another huge change is the lab area. No longer are you asked to sit in one of the side by side booths in order to have a blood draw, now you get a private room.
The checkout area is in a separate convenient bay at the end of each of the three exam hallways that are named Cranberry, Maple Syrup and Wild Rice and there are bathrooms everywhere.
The X-Ray room no longer looks like the back of someone’s garage, now it’s quite stylish, as is the 3-D mammography room; 3-D meaning the tissue is processed in layers, like an MRI, so when the film is read, the radiologist can get a much-better view of the complete breast, including breasts that are highly fibrous.
All the changes and conveniences in this new 23,000 square foot building were designed with patient’s needs in mind along with a complete medical staff and a host of specialists that make regular visits to the clinic.
The My Health online program was designed to keep the patient informed of their latest visit with test results and diagnosis recorded and sent directly to the patient via the internet.
The clinic, a member of National Health Services, Corps (nhsc.hrsa.gov) also offers discounted service to low income patients and all you have to do is ask a registration representative how to apply.
To call for an appointment at Essentia Health Spooner Clinic on Monday through Friday from 8:00 am until 5:00 pm, dial 715-635-2151. And if you’d like to check out the medical staff, log into EssentialHealth.org and click on Find a Medical Professional.
The state of Wisconsin can take the Spooner area off its shortage of doctors’ statistics; we seem to be doing quite well, thank you.
Last Update: Nov 01, 2016 9:57 pm CDT
