UO Suicide Prevention Week

In Memory of Anthony Laveroni

A few weeks ago, Jose Soto-Gates, White Bird Clinic’s Fundraiser, was contacted by a group of students involved with Greek life on the UO campus wanted to raise money for White Bird in memory of their dear friend, Anthony Laveroni. Together, they created a fundraising page to support mental health services and invite contributions from the wider community.

Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity will be hosting a Suicide Prevention Week, where they will be distributing the White Bird Help Book to all the fraternity’s and Sorority’s on campus to promote the 24 hour WB Crisis line services as well to highlight the help book as a community resource.

Fundraising for White Bird!

Community support has allowed White Bird to care for the most vulnerable among us for decades. We’re grateful for all we’ve accomplished together. In order to ensure that we’re working in alignment, we request that folks get in touch with us when planning anything to support White Bird, such as events or fundraisers. We’ll be happy to share ideas or lend a hand.

Please contact us at fundraising@whitebirdclinic.org or call (541) 345-7641. Thanks again, we couldn’t have done this without your help!

Black Lives Matter: A Fundraiser

Fundraiser Ended

proceeds from the sale of the shirts benefit eugblac, a racial injustice organization dedicated to police abolition, equitable education and black liberation. They have established a bail out fund for Black owned businesses, and have a goal of making an official Black library that they hope will become a sanctuary for the BIPOC community.  The CAHOOTS team thanks eugblac for helping them to understand cultural humility and adopt anti-racist practices.

Shop Now…

Community BIPOC Fundraiser

Fundraiser Ended

Sarah Knapp from Northwest Tattoo has set up a temporary storefront featuring goods and services from local tattooers, artists, and professionals in the Eugene/ Springfield area with 100% of the profits going directly to local Black, Indigenous, People Of Color (BIPOC) supporting organizations; White Bird’s CAHOOTS program, Community Alliance of Lane County, and the Eugene-Springfield chapter of NAACP.

The fundraiser begins June 25 at https://bipocfundraiser.com and will remain open through noon on July 9.

Also See:

White Bird Street Med

Help Us Kickstart the Street Med Program at White Bird

program on hold due to coronavirus social distancing requirements

Too many unhoused and low-income community members need medical care that they cannot access. In response, White Bird has developed a Street Medicine service, which will provide mobile health care in partnership with community nonprofits and government agencies. The service will reach vulnerable populations and deliver services directly to communities of need.

White Bird’s innovative service will help patients sustainably manage chronic diseases, promote preventative health, respond dynamically to evolving needs, and improve outcomes among communities disenfranchised from traditional healthcare.

The mobile clinic’s team will include a medical provider plus two clinic staff. Housed in a twenty-two-foot trailer, the clinic will provide a fully equipped exam room, capable of supporting acute and preventative care, on-site treatments, and office procedures.

As a link between clinical and community settings, the service will eliminate barriers to access for medically disenfranchised community members, who are disproportionately affected by many illnesses due to disparities in social determinants of health. These disparities represent a key area to target in order to better our community’s overall health and decrease healthcare spending. Mobile medical services have been shown to produce significant cost savings and represent a cost-effective care delivery model that improves health outcomes in underserved groups.

The Street Medicine program will also help patients navigate the larger healthcare system and connect them with medical and social resources in the community. Contact us for more information or click here to help us fundraise for this effort.

We are looking for a cargo van with a tow package to help us get this program off the ground! If you or someone you know has one they would like to put to immediate good use, please contact us at info@whitebirdclinic.org. Gifts to White Bird Clinic, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization, are deductible to the extent allowed by law.

Please click here to support this program

playing music

A Night for Sight Benefit Concert

Via a new arrangement with the Give Me Sight Foundation, Dr. John Haines with Oregon iLasik and Refractive will begin providing roughly three free cataract removal surgeries per week for White Bird Clinic patients. To generate funds to support their work, they are hosting a “Night For Sight” benefit concert event on November 22nd at The Shedd. The featured musical act will be The Good Time Travelers.

5:30pm Dinner – Enjoy the Newly renovated Main floor area of The Shedd

Social Hour with Open bar
Causal Buffet Style Dinner
Silent Auction and Quilts sponsored by Oregon Pacific Bank

7:30pm (Doors open at 7:00pm) -8:30pm Music with Friends

Video clips of Mission Work
Introductions and Recognition
John Haines, Music with Friends

8:30pm- 8:50pm Intermission and Silent Auction Closing

8:50pm – 9:50pm The Good Time Travelers

The Good Time Travelers are a multi-instrumental acoustic duo with vocal harmonies and a stage presence so big that they have been described as a “2-piece power-trio”. Pete Kartsounes and Michael Kirkpatrick have a sound that is rooted in bluegrass and folk music, but the sentiment is pure rock and roll. They’ve performed around the country at festivals such as Big Sky Big Grass (MT), Northwest String Summit (OR), Folk Alliance (MO), Winter Wondergrass (CA/CO), River City Roots Festival (MT), Beartrap Festival (WY), Mystic Hot Springs Music Festival (UT), and Salmonfest (AK). The Good Time Travelers have opened for Bluegrass greats such as Sam Bush, Leftover Salmon, and Del McCoury & David Grisman.

9:50pm- 10:00pm Check out and an evening ends

Buy Tickets

PenFed Credit Union Presents $4,000 Donation to White Bird Clinic

EUGENE, Ore., Oct. 3, 2019 /PRNewswire/ — PenFed Credit Union’s Eugene Service Center today announced it presented a $4,000 donation to White Bird Clinic, a nonprofit organization that provides affordable and friendly medical care to indigent, homeless, low-income, and otherwise marginalized populations, such as community members who are employed but uninsured or underinsured.

“White Bird Clinic’s reputation in the community is unparalleled, and they fill a critical gap with the medical and mental health services they provide to underserved populations in Lane County,” said PenFed’s Senior Vice President of Operations Chris Martin, who manages the Eugene Service Center. “On behalf of all PenFed employees, we want to thank all of them for all they do to support our community.”

White Bird Clinic has been giving back to the Eugene community since 1970 and offers a wide range of programs and services that are committed to providing client-centered and humanistic approaches to human services. Their highly qualified medical, mental health, and behavioral health professionals strive to meet each person where they are at and empower them to regain control of their own well-being.

For the check presentation, PenFed employees visited White Bird Clinic’s new dental office construction site located at 1415 Pearl Street in Eugene. During the visit, employees met with White Bird staff, including Crisis Office Manager Loretta McNally. The group touring the clinic learned that once completed, the office will have 12 dental chairs and allow increased dental care access for families.

“White Bird Clinic depends upon partners like PenFed Credit Union in order to respond to critical needs. PenFed’s generous support allows White Bird to do more for our community’s most vulnerable members,” said White Bird Clinic Executive Coordinator Chris Hecht.

The donation is part of PenFed’s commitment to giving over $100,000 to nonprofit organizations in the Eugene area this year, selecting local charities that align with the credit union’s core values of giving back and making a difference in the communities PenFed serves.

Since opening the service center in Eugene in 1996, PenFed has supported local veteran and community organizations and contributed over 2,000 volunteer hours and over $400,000 to charitable organizations throughout Lane County. PenFed has grown its Eugene-based workforce by 23% over the past decade and provides training at the entry level to increase skills for career growth.

About PenFed Credit Union
Established in 1935, Pentagon Federal Credit Union (PenFed) is America’s second-largest federal credit union, serving 1.8 million members worldwide with $24.5 billion in assets. PenFed Credit Union offers market-leading certificates, checking, credit cards, personal loans, mortgages, auto loans, student loans, and a wide range of other financial services with members’ interests always in mind. PenFed Credit Union is federally insured by the NCUA and is an Equal Housing Lender. 

SOURCE PenFed Credit Union

Related Links

http://www.PenFed.org

White Bird Clinic Celebrates Fifty Years with Major Expansion

In 1969, a group of student activists and concerned practitioners founded White Bird Clinic to provide crisis services and free medical care to counter-culture youth in Eugene. Having grown continuously for fifty years, White Bird now has ten programs, 200 staff members, and more than 400 volunteers.

To celebrate our fiftieth, we’re growing our programs, demonstrating our commitment to serving low income, under-resourced community members. In response to burgeoning community need, White Bird is expanding medical, dental, crisis, and CAHOOTS services.

White Bird has a fifty-year track record of identifying, assessing, and responding to community need by leveraging our existing resources. We respond rapidly and effectively by building on existing, successful programs. Our expansion consists of:

  1. Opening a new medical walk-in clinic for individuals who are low-income and/or homeless and uninsured. The clinic, below the existing primary care clinic, will provide an alternative for patients experiencing an acute issue who lack health insurance, diverting a great number of emergency room visits.
  2. Enlarging the dental program to increase its capacity to serve patients by nearly 75%. White Bird is renovating the building at 1415 Pearl St. into a clinic that will also provide denture care for elderly patients and serve more children and families.
  3. Increasing access to crisis services by moving the crisis program to 990 W 7th Ave., adjacent to the Whitaker neighborhood. The new crisis center will house the 24/7 crisis line phone service as well as walk-in services in a trauma-informed space intended to minimize environmental triggers that may be re-traumatizing.
  4. Expanding the hours and geographic coverage of CAHOOTS mobile crisis services, which responded to over 21,000 calls in 2018, saving an estimated $6M in emergency medical services costs alone.

In order to serve more folks in need, White Bird is taking a risk by growing many different programs at once, and we’re turning to the community for support and partnership. Please call 541.342.8255 or donate to support the project of your choice.

Donate Now

Cleveland Chicken

The Cleveland Chicken team, a 49 year old WBC fundraiser, will be BBQing chicken, as well as offering, chicken sausages, corn on the cob, lemonade and watermelon all three days of the County Fair, right outside W C Fields stage, do come.

White Bird at Fair

White Bird’s RockMed operates two first aid stations, one near Main Stage (Big Bird) and one in Xavanadu (Little Wing). White Bird is staffed 24 hours a day until Monday at 3pm, including several doctors around the clock, and nurses, EMTs, paramedics, and teams roving throughout the site that can be dispatched to incidents by radio. White Bird has been on site at the Oregon Country Fair for 50 years.

In an emergency go to the nearest Information Booth. If you cannot find one, ask at the nearest craft or food booth for directions. Each Information Booth can quickly contact emergency services.

PHOTO Credit Brian Bull / KLCC

Related

A Talk With Wren Arrington On White Bird Clinic’s OCF Services
  JUL 12, 2018

White Bird Clinic And Oregon Country Fair Nearing Half-Century Mark
By BRIAN BULL • JUL 12, 2018

Help us open a new medical walk-in clinic!

To celebrate our fiftieth, we’re growing our programs, demonstrating our commitment to serving low income, under-resourced community members. In response to burgeoning community need, White Bird is opening a new medical walk-in clinic for individuals who are low-income and/or homeless and uninsured. The clinic, below the existing primary care clinic, will provide an alternative for patients experiencing an acute issue who lack health insurance, diverting a great number of emergency room visits.

Garth Brooks Rock Medicine Fundraiser

White Bird Clinic’s event medicine program will provide medical and crisis intervention services for the Garth Brooks concert at Autzen

StadiumWhite Bird Clinic’s Event Medicine Program, Rock Medicine, will be providing Medical and Crisis Intervention services for the Garth Brooks Stadium Tour when he performs at Autzen Stadium in Eugene on Saturday, June 29th. We will bring 60 professional volunteers providing our unique model of Compassionate Care to a record-breaking sold-out crowd of 64,000 happy patrons.

Rock Medicine is a fundraising effort for White Bird Clinic so the services we provide at the event are provided by contract with the promoter and the funds we earn help support the amazing services White Bird provides all year long in Eugene & Springfield.

It’s a true labor of love and the work provides a great spirit of camaraderie among our volunteers!

If you have a background in Mental Health, Social Service, or Medical field and think you might like to volunteer with Rock Medicine at our next event, write to rockmed@whitebirdclinic.org for more information.

Support Us

This summer, Rock Medicine is launching a campaign to raise money for White Bird to open a new walk-in medical clinic for individuals who are low-income and/or homeless and uninsured. The clinic, below the existing primary care clinic, will provide an alternative for patients experiencing an acute issue who lack health insurance, diverting a great number of emergency room visits. Help us by making a donation or joining our fundraising team – click the image below for details!

 

Doc Ann’s Essay: White Bird at Fair ?

by Rock Medicine’s Medical Director, Dr Ann Cooley

“Can I give you a hug?”  This makes me pause for a moment.  You see I’m not really used to this kind of response from my patients.  As a full-time Emergency Medicine Physician, most of my patients are usually pretty scared and upset from waiting by the time they meet me, and understandably they don’t really feel like hugging.  But that’s not the case here in this dirt-floored clinic in the middle of the Oregon Country Fair.  Here I just put my medical skills to the test removing a large splinter from the hand of a young woman wearing a unicorn leotard, rainbow tutu, lime green fishnets, and glitter.  She pays me with a hug and a thank you, and it feels just as good as actually saving a life.

Rock Medicine at OCFSeveral years ago, I took over as the Medical Director for White Bird’s Rock Medicine program.  We are a fundraising arm for the clinic, and the work we do helps support many of the amazing programs White Bird provides in Eugene and Springfield.  We are a small army of volunteers who attend concerts and festivals throughout the year to help people have a safer party.  Unlike most event medicine programs, we are more than a couple of medics waiting at the back of the crowd.  We are a veritable army of crisis and medical professionals who volunteer our time to care for folks who sustain everything from minor bumps and bruises to dehydration to severe trauma.

My second patient of the day is having shortness of breath.  His long grey hair and beard are equal length, and he’s wearing an OCF staff shirt from when I was in high school.  I give him a breathing treatment, and we laugh about the fact that he does this every year even though he knows the dust will be terrible.  “Some old dogs have no interest in new tricks,” he tells me.  I encourage him to come back at any time.  The day progresses like this with a constant stream of bumps, bruises, and reminders to all who walk by to drink plenty of water and wear sunscreen.  The usual reply to this is, “We love you White Bird!” and while I’m hot and tired my heart is full.

Rock Medicine Booth at OCFMy final patient of the night is a young man.  I don’t know his name because every time we ask, he begins to laugh hysterically and then scream.  It appears he took his party a little too far tonight, and now comes the long journey back down to earth.  In my normal job, I wouldn’t have much choice but to give him medications to calm him down, and I have that option here too, but here at Oregon Country Fair on either side of him sits a crisis worker.  They have just started to sing to him, and they are reassuring him that he’s safe.  He smiles, lays down, and begins a long conversation about interdimensional time travel, and I know he’s going to be just fine.

As we approach the 50th year of the Oregon Country Fair, I am once again preparing to move my medical practice out of the state-of-the-art hospital and into a makeshift exam room.  I’ll be surrounded by hundreds of volunteers who set aside their July weekend every year to come take care of everyone who walks in.  All of our hard work will help raise money to help White Bird continue its amazing programs throughout the rest of the year, and while I love the ability to help with that, mostly I’m looking forward to getting paid in hugs.

Related Story

RockMed All Night Long

Jill Heiman Vision Fund Helps White Bird Clinic Provide Cold Weather Gear

Living on the streets is even harder without a sleeping bag. Thanks to a generous donation from the Jill Heiman Vision Fund, White Bird Clinic greatly increased our supply of cold weather gear during the coldest months of 2017-2018. When the weather turns to rain and sleet, unhoused residents of Lane County come to our clinic seeking warm clothing and bedding. We used funds to bulk order some of our most requested items.

Tarps, sleeping bags, socks, gloves, and hats are vital for people living outdoors in cold weather. White Bird collects donated items every year from community partners and supporters, but these unfortunately are never quite enough to meet community need. The Jill Heiman funds enabled us to buy items efficiently, in large quantities. We purchased 480 tarps, 320 sleeping bags, 2,550 pairs of socks, 240 pairs of gloves, and 240 knit winter hats. Most of these items have already been dispersed to folks in need, and the remaining stock will be depleted well before the cold weather ends.

Three of our departments distributed the grant funded purchases. Front Rooms, a respite and light day use resource in Eugene, distributed most of the items. Case managers from the Homeless department accessed gear for their clients. Some supplies, particularly sleeping bags, were distributed by CAHOOTS (Crisis Assistance Helping Out on the Streets), White Bird’s mobile crisis service. The people who received gear were mostly unhoused residents in neighborhoods on the east side of Eugene, though some reached people in the greater Eugene/Springfield metro area.

White Bird is a collective environment organized to enable people to gain control of their social, emotional and physical well-being through direct service, education and community. We greatly appreciate the kind and expedient support we’ve received from the Jill Heiman Fund both for this project, and in the past. You helped us provide critically needed winter wear for Lane County’s unhoused and underserved community members.

Many thanks to the Jill Heiman Fund Committee and our beloved Fair Family!