Tender Mercies, Inc.

Brandon O'Malley, Summer 2016

My time with Tender Mercies this summer has been an experience I won’t soon forget. I applied to be an intern with the Urban Health Project to learn more about my future patient population and take a more active role in the Cincinnati community. One of the specialties I am considering is emergency medicine and Tender Mercies was a perfect location to learn more about the homeless and mentally ill populations which disproportionally utilize emergency room resources. What I discovered this summer was how diverse the residents of Tender Mercies truly are. Moreover, I learned how best to approach difficult situations with compassion.

When Nirguna and I started our summer as interns there were no set expectations or guidelines for what our health project would be. It was our responsibility to address the health needs of the Tender Mercies residents as we saw fit. We worked closely with the housing director Mary Grover as well as the residential coordinators to learn about the health issues prevalent amongst Tender Mercies residents such as diabetes, hypertension and stress. We also familiarized ourselves with our client population by giving a survey to find out what the residents themselves would like addressed. The survey data led us to give a series of health information sessions with topics such as diabetes management, guided imagery meditation and stress. For two months we also opened up an afternoon health clinic for residents where they could meet with us about anything health related. Here we discussed nutrition, weight loss, medication adherence, withdrawal and any other topic which we felt we could provide assessment, guidance or motivation. Many residents came weekly so we could track the progress of their health goals such as lowering blood pressure or blood glucose.

From all of the important lessons the residents of Tender Mercies taught me I think the most important was how much more there is to a person or patient then meets the eye. I thought I had a decent grasp of what it meant to be homeless, but as I spent more and more time with the residents at Tender Mercies I realized I was very mistaken. There were people there from all walks of life that were dealing with unique situations. This taught me the importance of taking the time to invest in a patient and listen to their story. Nirguna and I were able to build trust with many of the residents at Tender Mercies and our most positive impact on the community may have been just that. This summer was so beneficial for both the residents and ourselves that Nirguna and I are attempting to get a medical student group to provide a monthly health clinic for the Tender Mercies residents in the future. The Urban Health Project is an amazing program that builds trust and empathy between the community and the future of the medical field. I will try to carry the lessons I learned at Tender Mercies into my practice of medicine in the future.