MAY NEWSLETTER | 2021
The Path Forward
Featured photo taken pre-COVID-19.
The Path Forward As the battle against COVID-19 continues, I’m reminded of King Solomon’s wisdom when he wrote: “Look straight ahead and fix your eyes on what lies before you.” (Proverbs 4:25 NLT) For Siloam, forging a path forward is an opportunity to encourage partnerships with our patient communities in their journeys to improved health. This in turn means we must listen well and learn the cultural contexts that are key to building the trust necessary to ensure patients can achieve their desired results.
community-at-large vaccine readiness. Siloam Health is honored to partner with the Metro Public Health Department as well as Conexión Américas, the Tennessee Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC), and others in the fight against COVID-19 in culturally marginalized and underserved communities. Together, we have increased COVID-19 education and safety awareness while helping to decrease the pandemic’s impact across sections of our city.
In 2020, we learned that many patient families had been terribly affected by the pandemic, so we adapted in order to serve them at their point of need. This year, the path forward will have us doubling down on efforts to adjust clinic schedules and make other accommodations as we continue to respond to community needs for vaccinations and whole-person care.
In the following pages you’ll see glimpses of how Siloam’s entire team is doing its part to ensure the safety of our neighbors. These collective efforts could not happen without your generosity, prayers, volunteerism, and encouragement. YOU are helping to amplify and extend our impact.
With vaccination clinics now organized at both our Melrose and Antioch clinics, our team is working to safely administer vaccines to established patients and the most vulnerable in their communities. We are also working in those communities to bolster
Thank you!
Jim Henderson, MD Chief Medical Officer
The Path To Erasing Fear For 17 years, Medical Assistant Emad Khalil has been an inspiration inside Siloam Health’s walls and to the community-at-large. With his gracious demeanor and dedication to providing health care transformed by love, Emad is a respected and sought-after voice — especially in Nashville’s Coptic Egyptian community. “Even people who don’t know I work for Siloam ask me about medications or where to seek help if they don’t have health insurance,” he said smiling. When the COVID-19 vaccine rollout began, those inquiries significantly increased as many of his community friends expressed doubt about the vaccine’s safety. “Many of us in the immigrant community are dealing with twice the sickness and death due to COVID-19: our loved ones here in America and those in our home countries,” he reflected. “We’ve been praying for a vaccine, but some are afraid to take it because they have so many unanswered questions.” From rumors about side effects to worry about its cost, efficacy, and more, Emad believes most of the questions he’s received about vaccination fall under one category: misinformation. “Anything can look scary when you don’t have enough information,” he said. “Our role at Siloam isn’t just to administer vaccines, but also to answer questions and ease people’s minds.” For Emad, the time Siloam took to provide that additional vaccine education went a long way. “I was confident about taking the vaccine because Siloam’s doctors and nurses prepared me with details about its effectiveness and assured me there
Featured photo taken pre-COVID-19.
were no serious side effects,” he said. “After taking it, I felt proud knowing I’d done my part to help protect myself, my family, and my community.” That pride also comes from being an important part of Siloam’s efforts to ensure immigrant communities are not excluded from pivotal conversations about the vaccine due to language barriers or other obstacles.
“Our role at Siloam isn’t just to administer vaccines, but also to answer questions and ease people’s minds.”
“Siloam’s Community Health Workers work with community leaders to give information about vaccine availability, send updates via video announcements, and there’s even a team that contacts local churches with high immigrant populations to encourage vaccination,” he said. “Siloam’s been wonderful with how it’s gone the extra mile.” Emad says efforts like these are the crucial bridge between underserved communities and the health care they need. “The first step to reducing vaccination hesitancy is erasing fear,” he said. “Siloam’s work with immigrant communities using materials in their languages proves it’s willing to confront those fears directly.”