The road to quality health care
Aimee Hornberger/Columbia Basin Herald<br>Karen Olson gets on the Health Express Shuttle at the Moses Lake Clinic Thursday. This is Olson's first time to take the shuttle to Wenatchee and she says this will help her husband from having to drive every day and save money on gas. The shuttle leaves five days a week from the Moses Lake Clinic at 8 a.m. to take patients for treatment in Wenatchee and is scheduled to arrive back in Moses Lake between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m.
Health Express Shuttle takes patients to Wenatchee for treatment
MOSES LAKE — People often talk about the road to success or life in the fast lane, but the road that the Health Express Shuttle is taking is one that the health care community in Moses Lake believes will lead to a better quality of life for patients.
The shuttle service, which provides transportation for cancer patients and others who need medical services not available in Moses Lake, has been in operation since Dec. 1.
The idea to provide the service came after different entities within the health care community attempted to raise funds to bring cancer treatment services to Moses Lake, said Kathy Parker, the regional director with People for People. However the "cost of obtaining the equipment rose quicker than the ability to raise funds and that's when we started looking at the idea of providing transportation," Parker said.
"Just like Bush has a No Child Left Behind policy for education, this is our way of saying no patients should be left behind," said David Olson, administrator with the Moses Lake Clinic.
With radiation treatments requiring patients to receive treatment at least once a day for several weeks, this provides the convenience of not having to worry about driving an hour and a half to get there and "this is a community effort to get the services they need and do it in a helpful manner," said Annie Andersen, ARNP nurse practitioner for oncology at the Moses Lake Clinic and is also a board member with the Moses Lake Cancer Foundation.
"It will help save gas," said Katherine Olson who is taking the shuttle for the first time today.
The shuttle currently has seven riders, Parker said and runs daily, leaving the Moses Lake Clinic at 8 a.m. and returning between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. Stops in Ephrata and Quincy are also made if there are patients who need the service.
In order to ride the shuttle, patients must be referred by one of the following health care providers: Samaritan Hospital, Moses Lake Community Health, the Moses Lake Clinic, Columbia Basin Hospital, or the Wenatchee Valley Clinic. Most riders will be charged a $1.50, however, the Moses Lake Clinic and Wenatchee Valley Clinics have agreed to pay those costs for their referred riders.
"The need for something like this was part of starting the cancer foundation," said Howard Gallion, founder of the Moses Lake Cancer Foundation. "The ultimate goal is to get all that treatment available in Moses Lake and this is one step in that direction."