Street medicine team takes to Anaheim streets to treat homeless, encourage services

Matt Hurst, 52, a former homeless man who had been living on the streets for “10 years or more”, had always been “indifferent” when offered services in the past.

It was an offer of dog food for his bull terrier, Minnie, from Health Care in Action’s street medicine team that broke down his wall of skepticism, he said.

“When they did that, it just opened me up.”

Through repeated interactions with the team, trust was built and Hurst accepted the offer of services. Hurst and Minnie recently moved into their first one-bedroom apartment.

Hurst and other formerly homeless people joined local and regional public officials Thursday for the launch of CalOptima Health’s street medicine program in a third Orange County city: Anaheim, which according to the point-in-time count of homeless people in January, numbered 600 people. living on the street.

The Street Medicine program is a partnership between CalOptima Health, the county’s publicly funded health care provider; the local city, in this case Anaheim; and Healthcare in Action, a nonprofit operation providing medical, behavioral health, substance abuse, housing navigation and other services by meeting people where they are, on the streets.

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CalOptima Health and its street medicine provider Healthcare in Action launched their mobile medical practice in Anaheim, Calif., Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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Healthcare in Action received a two-year, $2.5 million grant to fund the program.

One of his case managers guided Hurst through the process of obtaining a birth certificate and other documents to help him obtain housing and other services and he receives health support and other, he said, to succeed.

“I’m still impressed,” Hurst said. “I’m in a place now. I have everything I need for this place. I feel like a human being again, because I’ve been there for a decade and I didn’t even feel human after a while.

And since overcoming his own resistance to accepting services, Hurst has convinced others who were on the streets with him to accept the help offered by the street medicine team.

With its mobile medical van – a medical office on wheels – the Street Medicine Team is designed to serve the homeless community in parks, under highways, behind buildings and other places where people shelter.

The program launched in Garden Grove in April 2023 and expanded to Costa Mesa in August.

“Our street medicine program meets our unhoused members where they are and provides ongoing primary and social care directly to them,” said Kelly Bruno-Nelson, executive director of CalOtima’s Medi-Cal/CalAIM initiative. “Access to primary care is an important outcome of the program, but at CalOptima Health we know there is no medicine more powerful than housing, which is why connecting these members to permanent housing is also the objective of the program.

For example, the street medicine team was able to make initial contact with homeless people at the First Presbyterian Church of Garden Grove, known to many as the “shower church,” to offer food and allow for people to shower.

“This is what we do,” said Diana Meier, manager of Healthcare in Action’s street medicine programs. “We always plan the day before, so we schedule appointments with members, whether they’re medical or case management, and then the extra time we allow for canvassing. »

Homelessness is the defining issue impacting society today, said Anaheim Mayor Ashleigh Aitken, and the No. 1 concern for residents and business owners.

“This is a double tragedy that is slowly destroying lives while affecting neighborhoods like those around us,” Aitken said.

But simply treating unhoused people for their medical problems and leaving them on the streets “is not humane and it’s not sustainable,” she said.

“This is primary care, an important first step in getting people off the streets,” Aitken said. “Street medicine may take place on our streets, but it is a pathway out of homelessness. »