See the grand opening of Portland Fire & Rescue’s Community Health flagship program – Community Health Assess and Treat as it opens their new facility in outer East Portland …
The one-time offices of the Powell Valley Road Water District are now the headquarters of Portland Fire & Rescue’s Community Health Assess & Treat (CHAT) program.
Story and photos by David F. Ashton
In the building originally constructed for the Powell Valley Road Water District at 12350 SE Powell Boulevard — before that district was annexed into the City of Portland — has been repurposed yet again.
After the water district moved out, the building served for many years as the offices of the nonprofit Human Solutions (now renamed Our Just Future) organization – which has now moved to the Gateway District.
Pausing for a photo at the open house: PF&R Community Health Nurse Manager Michelle LaVina, and Deputy Portland Fire Chief Stephanie Sullivan.
It was in that same building, on August 8, that Portland Fire & Rescue (PF&R) held a “Community Health Section Open House” for their new Community Health Assess & Treat (CHAT) headquarters and offices for expanded services that they offer.
“CHAT provides a medical response to ‘low acuity’ calls,” explained PF&R Battalion Chief and Deputy Fire Chief Stephanie Sullivan that day.
Workers talk about program issues in the CHAT Logistics Center room.
“The whole mission of our CHAT program is to improve the health care system by treating people – right where they are – meeting them in the community,” Sullivan told East Portland News.
Portland’s CHAT program started in 2021 – and has primarily operated in the “central downtown Portland” corridor. “There have been a couple of different iterations; one, in cooperation with Care Oregon, has four units right now,” said Sullivan.
In addition to treating low-acuity medical calls, CHAT has two focused Overdose Response Teams (ORT) that will either be dispatched directly to potential overdoses, or will intercept a potential overdose call enroute, she pointed out. “Each focused response by our ORT teams keeps a CHAT rig in service, to be able to respond to a different emergency that may be taking place – and, each gets a responder trained in ‘Trauma Informed Care’ to respond to the overdose.
Gathering for the CHAT open house are members of PF&R and others.
“We also do follow-up,” the CHAT leader mentioned. “We also have a pilot program with Buprenorphine [a synthetic opioid developed in the late 1960s used to treat pain opioid use disorder]. And, we do this ‘in the field’ – seven days a week – rather than in a clinic or in an emergency department.”
The CHAT program services all of Portland, she acknowledged. “But one of the benefits of having this location here — on the east side — is that we now have a second overdose response team here on the east side, as well as having the one on the west side.”
CHAT rigs are outfitted with the same equipment – including a LIFEPAK 15 Cardiac Monitor/Defibrillator unit – that’s found on all PF&R engines, ladder trucks, and rescue units.
Asked how one may request a CHAT response, Sullivan replied, “We are contacted through 911; the 911 dispatch center will dispatch CHAT responders to certain types of low-acuity calls instead of sending a fire engine or ladder truck.”
Addressing people at the open house is Rene Gonzalez, the Portland City Commissioner of Public Safety.
“It’s become clear that we need a strong [CHAT] response here in outer East Portland,” Portland City Commissioner Rene Gonzalez told East Portland News at the event. “We see the headquartering of CHAT on the ‘east side’ as further support for the community out here, where there are larger neighborhood populations, and in some cases lower income demographics.”
For more information about the CHAT program, see their official webpage: CLICK HERE.
© 2024 David F. Ashton ~ East Portland News™
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