September/October 2000

CONTENTS Back to Cover About Cattails TeleHealth brings specialists to outlying centers Study evaluates need to repair groin hernias Positive discipline maintains children's self-esteem Marshfield researchers helped map human genome, now seek disease-causing genes Gamma Knife a new treatment for brain tumors New Marshfield Clinic program assures food safety from farm to table Flu shots now practical for some people with egg allergy Saving your sight: New treatment improves macular degeneration outcomes New faces Marshfield Clinic Calendar of Events

Family Health Center helps Clinic patients afford care

Antoinette Brusky keeps an orderly life in Mosinee. She tends to her garden, works a part-time job and spends time with her family. But after more than 20 surgeries over the past 30 years, Brusky is partially disabled and unable to work full-time. She counts on family and friends to ensure day-to-day tasks are handled. Her grandson mows the lawn; her daughter helps around the house. Because Brusky's long-term health problems have left her unable to work, Medicare helps pay for some of her care. But like other people with low incomes, she was spending a large portion of her limited earnings for health care, especially prescriptions. Then, 13 years ago, Brusky's physician at Marshfield Clinic-Mosinee Center recommended she turn to Family Health Center for help. Like nearly 3,000 other people in central and northern Wisconsin, Brusky found the insurance-like community health center gave her relief.

Mosinee resident Antoinette Brusky's many medical expenses took most of her earnings. Family Health Center now helps pay for her care.

"I'm grateful," Brusky said. "As time went by there was more and more medication. The cost of it is ridiculous." Although Medicare pays for some of her medical bills, it was the cost of drugs that led her to Family Health Center. "I was such a risk," she continued. "I couldn't get any insurance."

Clinic resources used to start Family Health Center