Published October 2003

Health-care Briefs

Stillaguamish Tribe
opens methadone clinic
A much-anticipated new era in drug treatment in Snohomish County began in September, when the Stillaguamish Tribe’s methadone clinic opened.

Methadone is a prescribed substitute drug used to help break people from addictions to opiates, such as heroin or prescription Oxycontin.

The new clinic, called Island Crossing Counseling Services, is the first of its kind in the county and the only one north of King County. Other methadone clinics have been proposed in Lynnwood and Everett, but both stalled because of neighborhood opposition. In contrast, the tribe’s rural location near the Arlington exit on I-5 drew relatively little public comment.

State and federal regulations allow such clinics to treat a maximum of 350 patients. But the new clinic is beginning slowly, said Thomas Ashley, the clinic’s director. Sixteen patients were given doses of methadone Monday. Another 10 were scheduled for individual treatment assessments this week.

“By the beginning of next week, we’ll have our initial goal of 30 patients,” Ashley said.

So far, about 20 percent of the patients are American Indians. The clinic will serve members of area tribes as well as the general public.

About 80 other people have been put on a waiting list, and those people will be gradually taken on by the clinic in the next several months, Ashley said.

Starting slowly will allow the clinic’s staff of 10 to identify any problems before taking on a bigger patient load.

Stevens Hospital steps in
to aid women’s clinic recruitment
Labor and delivery services at Stevens Hospital in Edmonds potentially could be at risk unless two or more obstetrics doctors can be recruited by year’s end.

Because baby delivery is seen as one of the hospital’s key services, officials of the public hospital have stepped in to try to recruit the physicians for Sound Women’s Care in Edmonds, the only clinic specializing in obstetrics and gynecology in the area.

Clinic doctors delivered about 75 percent of the 1,404 babies born at Stevens Hospital last year, said Dr. John Todd, the hospital’s medical director.

One of the five physicians who are currently taking obstetrics patients has told the clinic that she will discontinue the obstetrics part of her practice at the end of the year. And another clinic doctor stopped delivering babies in May.

The clinic said it has been trying to recruit new doctors for about three years.

But the task is not easy, considering rising malpractice rates, the area’s relatively high cost of living and comparatively low rates of payment by government and private health insurance plans.

Todd said the hospital has been meeting with the clinic to try to find answers to both the need to recruit more obstetrics doctors and the cost of malpractice insurance.

Although Sound Women’s Care is not part of the group of medical clinics owned by the hospital, “because of the importance of this service to the citizens of the hospital district, we think it’s important to participate in the resolution of this issue,” Todd said.

Tulalip Health Center opens
The Tulalip Health Center has come a long way from a cramped, one-room clinic in a now condemned building to the spacious, $9.5 million clinic with 15 examination rooms that opened in September.

“It took five years to get it constructed,” said Steve Gobin, the Tulalips’ interim director of health and human services.

It began with a $500,000 grant from the federal Indian Health Service, and included health-care fees, a $1.9 million tribal payment and a loan.

The clinic will provide primary care, maternal-child care, diabetes care and dental care.

The clinic, at 7520 Totem Beach Road, has 26,000 square feet of space, compared with 6,300 at the previous facility. There are two urgent care rooms, along with the dental clinic and offices for clinic manager Karen Fryberg, a medical director, five doctors and a nurse practitioner.

The clinic serves 3,500 confederation members and 1,500 others, including members of other federally recognized tribes.

The clinic is 60 percent funded by the federal government, but is not allowed to charge for covered services unless a patient has third-party insurance. The Tulalips contract for outside care for services not covered by the government program, and the government doesn’t pay for tribal health facilities, Gobin said.

“We were extremely fortunate that we had the opportunity to roll the clinic into the casino’s syndicated loan,” he said. “We had to fix our clinic, and we took it upon ourselves to do it.”

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