Success In The Field

On the last day of Pre Service Orientation (PSO), I was both anxious and excited to meet my host site mentor. I had only spoken to Claudette over the phone during my interview for UF Health. From the very beginning of our interactions, I could tell she was very knowledgeable and outgoing. I am an introverted person and was just at the beginning of my professional career, so I was worried about whether I would be able to meet her expectations. However, after one month at my host site, Claudette has become a great colleague and resource and has been supportive of my learning and growth..

During my service term with National Health Corps Florida AmeriCorps Program, I am serving at UF Health as a care coordinator in women’s health services at Healthy Start. This gives me the opportunity to provide direct service to pregnant women during their prenatal period and new mothers in the postpartum period. Through my service, I provide risk assessments, pregnancy testing, and resource referrals to high risk clients.

Claudette works as an educator in women’s services at UF Health. Her passion for providing health education and improving the programs here at UF Health and in the community motivates me to push myself to better the lives of others during my service year. In this interview, Claudette discusses her accomplishments regarding access to health care and connections to community resources throughout her career.

Describe your early career and how it led you to UF Health.

While living in North Carolina, I worked for a health center immunization office for 4 years. Afterwards I taught Health in a middle school. My community work focused on adolescent and young adult social, emotional and reproductive health, including risk behavior reduction.   

When I moved to Jacksonville, I was given the opportunity to work with disabled and disadvantaged persons in programs offered at Goodwill. 

Prior to working at UF Health Jacksonville, I worked in the Maternal Child Health Division of the previously named Duval County Health Department. My former supervisor there learned about a position she thought I would be a good match for and encouraged me to apply for a position here.

What are some of your greatest previous and current accomplishments regarding providing access to health services and community resources?

My greatest accomplishments are being part of inaugural health and community resources at or on behalf of UF Health. These include coordinating 3 nationally recognized programs: The Patient and Family Partnership Council for Quality and Safety, Centering Pregnancy and Boot Camp for New Dads. In addition to the General Mills Feeding America Campaign and Summer Break Spot at UF Health.  I was also fortunate to be a part of the inaugural programming in New Town Success Zone.

I have written and received more than $60K in grants and award monies toward health programing in my professional career.       

The Rotary Club of San Marco once presented me a certificate of appreciation and dedicated Polio immunizations to “approximately 20 children of the World”.

My colleagues have submitted Customer Service is the Key, Applause or Standing Ovation recognitions based on their interaction with me or on behalf of clients or patient’s I helped.  These are the most meaningful since they are from people I work alongside daily. 

Do you have any future plans or projects to improve health care and community resource access?

My current work involves employee training & development to promote quality programs and services.  I enjoy using my experiences coupled with evidenced practices to help employees perform at their best.
For the organization, I am currently participating in the UF Health Community Health Needs Assessment.

This blog post was written by NHC FL member, Elyssia Johnan.

Elyssia serves at UF Health-Healthy Start as a Care Coordinator.