OCMA Blog

Community Partnerships: Bringing Health and Wellness to Where We Live and Work



By Annette Walker, Executive Vice President, Strategic Services at St. Joseph Hoag Health

Keeping people – and communities – healthy means more than treating illness and injury. It means partnering with people before they get sick and making it easy and convenient for them to exercise, get preventive care like vaccines and screenings and learn how to eat right.

But in today's fast-paced lifestyle, a lifestyle where we're eating breakfast in the car and checking emails at night on our phones, our health sometimes takes a back seat. But what's the solution? Health and wellness professionals need to meet people where they live and work.

One way we are addressing this at St. Joseph Hoag Health is through our Wellness Corners which are located in neighborhood and office settings. This is helping local employees and residents get their screenings, making them healthier than ever because health care services are available within steps of their offices and front doors.

Offering basic medical care, the Wellness Corner focus on services that help to improve our overall health and wellness and prevent chronic conditions through lifestyle management programs. Members of the local workforce and residential community can stop by to get a flu shot, review his lab test results to ensure that his cholesterol levels have gone down (due to a new healthy eating routine) and attend a seminar about the benefits of mindful meditation.

Our centers located at Four Park Plaza at Jamboree Center, the Park Place business community and The Village at Irvine Spectrum neighborhood are emerging as successful clinics that empower people to take control of their health to prevent illnesses and increase their well-being. We are planning to open additional locations throughout Orange County soon, each with the goal to make healthy living for our family, friends and neighbors more convenient, flexible and accessible.

By making access to health care and wellness programs convenient, we can help people manage their health and ward off illness. This is the health care model of the present and of the future.

Annette Walker is executive vice president, strategic services for St. Joseph Hoag Health where she is responsible for the strategy, business development, marketing and communications. She works directly with senior executives and physicians to develop, support and implement the strategic objectives and competitive positioning of the health ministry. For additional information about the Wellness Corners, click here.



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