ACHI - Adventist Community Health Initiative
I want to discuss just a few of the aspects of what ACHI is, how it works and how this ministry can be brought to your church. After reading this page, if you have specific questions about planning an event with your local church, please call or email me.
The Lake Union owns portable dental equipment as well as portable eye care equipment.
We have 15 portable dental units; any combination of 15 dentists and hygienists can use the 15 units.
We provide all of the dental supplies that are needed to run a dental clinic - gloves, gowns, needles/anesthetic, "drills", filling material, all the tools needed to provide the services.
We have Digital x-ray equipment to give a proper diagnosis for the doctors to utilize.
We have four sterilizers to properly clean the equipment after being used on each patient.
We also provide equipment to do eye exams. We can provide four lanes to do eye exams. I also work with a not-for-profit, Adventist organization out of Texas that can provide glasses for $10 a pair. We can discuss this aspect in more detail as we proceed with event planning.
There is always the question of malpractice and general liability insurance for one of these events. This is something that has been researched; the Lake Union does provide a $10M malpractice/general liability policy to cover all volunteers & professionals that help with one of these events (just to give you a rough idea of what the Lake Union pays for the malpractice liability policy per event is roughly $2700-2900). We can, upon request, also provide an "Additionally insured" policy to any venue such as community centers, non church affiliated school gymnasiums, etc.
As I mentioned above, several of these events occur throughout the year. This year there are 20 event spots on the schedule; as of Oct 2017, there are already 18 events booked for 2018. What this means is that I do rely heavily on a local coordinator and the volunteers in that church to help facilitate such an event. I will give direction and help with questions that come up, but again, keep in mind that I am doing this throughout the Union and cannot be present at every planning meeting.
There are three factors that must be addressed fairly soon in your planning. The first is to select a date when you want to do the event. Please see the Schedule page on this website to see the calendar of all of the event locations that are already scheduled and what days are still available. The second aspect is to find a venue where such an event could be held. The location must be easily accessible to our target audience - the under insured/under served population. The venue must also be large enough to house not only the dental equipment but also the eye-care equipment, if you choose to utilize that. If you choose to also do a Health Expo then please also plan the venue space requirements accordingly. The third aspect is usually the most challenging and that is that I do rely on you to help find and coordinate all of the volunteers, which includes dentists, hygienists, eye doctors, opticians, and other general volunteers. I wish I had a bus-load of all of the people needed to run one of these events that I could just load up and bring to each event but unfortunately I don't have that luxury! We have done 25+ events throughout the Union so I can certainly share the list of dentists, hygienists and eye doctors that have volunteered in the past in your state.
I do want to discuss the cost aspect that we ask each church to be aware of. The overall cost that the Union incurs is roughly $5000 per event. This includes the cost of the malpractice insurance as well as the expense to purchase/restock all of the supplies that was used at that event. The Lake Union does ask that the hosting church(es) help offset this total expense for a fee of $2500. This is sent to the Union and not given to me (all of my personal expenses such as mileage, lodging, meals, etc., are above and beyond the stated $5000 expense but all of those expenses are paid for by the Union and not part of the $2500 fee that we ask the church to pay).
I do want to discuss other expenses that you may incur that would be above and beyond the $2500 fee. If there is a fee associated with renting or using the venue, advertising/promoting expenses, any books or literature that you want to giveaway, any expenses associated with running a Health Expo - if you choose to do one - such as blood/glucose screening equipment, air/flow meter equipment, etc., would be at your own expense. One other expense I highly recommend that you consider is to provide a lunch to all of the volunteers that are working that day. The reason I suggest this is because what I've seen occur at other events where a lunch was not provided is that the volunteers have to go somewhere to get lunch and they may spend 1 to 2 hours away and that cuts out from your ability to continue seeing guests. It does not need to be anything elaborate or expensive, just something nutritious and filling so they can get back to work quickly. One other expense that's some events have chosen to incur is to provide a T-shirt to each of the volunteers. I have heard that that can get a little pricey so that is up to you to choose to do or not. It certainly is not necessary, though!
I do recommend that when you start looking at dates that you give yourself at least 4 to 6 months of time to plan and coordinate an event such as this. The reason for that is it does take a little time to secure all of the professional and nonprofessional volunteers as well as securing a venue and making sure all of the other details are in place.
I hope this bit of information helps you and your thinking and planning process as you look to move forward. If you have any other questions about the event or available dates please feel free to email or call me.
I hope you have a great day!
Randy Griffin
randy.griffin@lakeunion.org
317-409-3260