Collaborative efforts support poor elderly. A nursing center teams up with area churches to care for the elderly in...

In many communities across the United States today, churches and hospitals are forming alliances to better serve the needs of the elderly. Bon Secours Hospital-Villa Maria Nursing Center in North Miami, FL, sponsors programs that deter institutionalization. Villa Maria took these efforts one step further in September 1990 with the development of Project Good Help, a church-based outreach program that provides support services to help the poor, frail elderly continue independent living in the community. Villa Maria has coordinated the project with churches because they share a sense of mission. Only churches in areas where many needy elderly persons live are selected to participate in Project Good Help. Areas that lack services are given priority. Project Good Help often coordinates with other professional social service agencies to provide assistance. Catholic Community Services, for example, focuses on nutrition, and Project Good Help focuses on assessing unmet social service needs. The two community groups refer clients to one another. Project Good Help demonstrates that the healthcare and church communities can work together in innovative ways to provide cost-effective community service when they share a mission of caring for the poor and the elderly and are mutually supportive.