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The Power Eastern Oregon Podcast explores topics which affect small towns and rural communities in eastern Oregon and beyond. With the help of business and community partners, we will discuss the foundations of healthy communities, innovative new technologies, and challenges we all face. We’ll also explore the value of cooperatives and member-owned utilities and how Oregon Trail Electric Cooperative contributes to the health and growth of our service territory.
Paige Witham:
Welcome to the Power Eastern Oregon Podcast,
where we celebrate the people and partnerships that make Eastern
Oregon thrive. I'm your host, Paige Witham,
marketing and community relations coordinator at OTEC.
And today with us, we have Samantha Yarbrough and Bob Gomes from
the Harney District Hospital.
Welcome to the show.
Bob Gomes:
Thank you. It's good to be here.
Samantha Yarbrough:
Thanks for having us.
Paige Witham:
Absolutely. I'm looking forward to getting to know more about you
both and the hospital.
But before we get into it, let's kick things off with a safety
share.
March is National Nutrition Month,
and here are a couple of tips around something we all have in
common – we all need to eat. So you can prevent foodborne
illnesses by keeping perishable foods refrigerated,
avoiding thawing food on the counter,
and ensuring you wash produce properly.
You can avoid mindless snacking on office treats,
focusing on nutrient dense foods like fruits,
vegetables, and protein to keep energy levels stable.
And if you plan meals and snacks ahead,
you can ensure nutritious choices,
which also reduces reliance on fast food and saves money.
So, Bob, what is one nutritional tweak you have tried recently?
Bob Gomes:
Yeah, well, I'm blessed. I have a wife that is a health nut when
it comes to cooking,
and so she takes care of me. But you know,
it's opposite of what we usually think of.
But one of the things I recently did based on my provider's
recommendation was eat more protein.
I wasn't eating enough protein. And as I did,
I actually started feeling better and actually dropped weight,
believe it or not. And so what guy doesn't love more meat?
Paige Witham:
Yeah, exactly.
Bob Gomes:
And it was prescribed by my doctor.
So that's one I've done recently that's been really helpful.
Just feeling better and body mechanics.
Paige Witham:
Yeah, yeah. And Samantha, what about you?
Samantha Yarbrough:
Well, I am a coffee addict, and I'm trying really hard to just
keep it to one coffee a day and then switching to water
throughout the rest of the day so that I'm not getting
dehydrated.
Paige Witham:
And yeah, for sure.
Samantha Yarbrough:
Not getting all those added calories because I have to have the
fancy Starbucks coffee,
not just the plain.
Paige Witham:
I always tell people I drink coffee for the creamer,
not for the coffee.
So I'm right there with you. I actually recently started doing
that too.
And one thing that I've tried that's been really helpful because
when I have water,
I drink it great, but I often forget to drink water.
So I've been starting my morning by drinking just a bottle of
water or a cup of water first thing in the morning before I do
anything else. And that's been really helpful in getting my
energy levels up and being more hydrated and all of the good
things that come from proper hydration.
So thank you guys for participating in our safety share.
I would like for you both to kind of introduce yourself,
let our listeners know who you are,
what you do, and something fun about yourself.
Bob Gomes:
No. That's great. So I'm Bob Gomez,
I'm the CEO here at the hospital.
I've been in health care administration and executive for 36
years and have been around the world doing that.
And so that's kind of unique. I've gotten a lot of different
experiences and stuff,
and so I really enjoy it. In my job,
what's really nice is making a difference in the lives of those
that take care of patients. And that's what gets me up every
morning,
and that's why I've done it so long.
Paige Witham:
Yeah. That's awesome. And what is one thing that others might
want to know about who Bob is?
Bob Gomes:
You know, there's a lot of unique things about me.
One of the things I'll share is I am retired Air Force,
believe it or not. I know I look young. Very young.
And I've been doing healthcare since retiring for over 25 years,
and I did it in the military.
But one of the unique things is I actually started out working on
nav systems on aircraft.
Paige Witham:
Oh, really?
Bob Gomes:
And I was actually one of the first people to work on GPS when it
was classified.
Paige Witham:
Well, we're going to have to talk after this because my dad is an
avionics electronics technician to this day.
So we'll talk more about that off air.
Bob Gomes:
Yeah maybe, maybe I worked for him and got in trouble. So maybe
that's it. That's what I did.
Paige Witham:
Probably not. And then Samantha,
how about you?
Samantha Yarbrough:
Yeah, I'm Samantha Yarbrough. I'm the marketing and public
relations director here at the hospital.
And I was born and raised here in Harney County,
so this is home to me.
I, after high school, went off to become a journalist.
I went to school at University of Oregon,
and then I came back and worked for a local newspaper for 11
years.
Paige Witham:
Wow.
Samantha Yarbrough:
Loved it.And then this job opportunity came open and I was like,
it's kind of like being a reporter for the hospital.
So I get to just focus on reporting what the hospital's doing and
introducing our new doctors and telling people about services
that we provide. So it's kind of a fun way to use my degree in a
way I never thought I would.
Paige Witham:
Yeah, you're a bona fide storyteller.
Yeah, I love that. I love that. So let's get into a little bit
about the hospital.
What local tradition near your hospital feels like home?
Bob Gomes:
You know, for me, I've thought about this question a lot is,
you know,
first question is where's home? You know,
I'm from the northwest,
so I grew up and my wife and I met in Spokane,
and we've had a lot of good experiences moving around the world.
But you know, the thing I really like here is our food carts.
Paige Witham:
Oh, yeah.
Bob Gomes:
You know, there's a lot of different things. I love to bike,
a lot of people know that. But afterwards I like to go to the
food carts, get something tasty,
and we've got a fantastic.
Why, we don't have a lot. The ones we have are fantastic,
and I've tried them all,
so that's something that I love everywhere I go.
Paige Witham:
Yeah. That's awesome. That's awesome. How about you,
Samantha?
Samantha Yarbrough:
Well, I was teasing with Bob earlier when we were looking at the
questions, and I was saying, well, I was actually kind of born in
this hospital. Not the same building,
but –"
Paige Witham:
Yeah.
Samantha Yarbrough:
Same grounds. They've remodeled it since,
so this hospital is home to me.
The whole community is home to me.
But for me, I think our big homecoming would be our county fair
every year.
That's when everybody comes home and visits family and people
from the way out,
far reaches of Harney County, come together and spend time
together,
and you get to catch up with people you don't see because they're
out busy on the ranch.
And yeah, so to me, that's kind of synonymous with home is our
our county fair every year.
Paige Witham:
I could totally see that. You know,
one thing that I really love about the fair.
Yes, it does bring everybody together,
but it's also everybody is coming together,
and they're so full of joy. Like everyone there,
I've never been to a county fair until,
you know, a kid drops their ice cream or something. But most of
the time they've got a smile on their face.
Bob Gomes:
Well, who doesn't love a funnel cake?
Paige Witham:
Exactly. Yeah, absolutely.
Samantha Yarbrough:
For us, it's the lion balls. The Lion's Club makes these deep
fried dough balls,
which is not nutritious, but very good in moderation.
Those are, I look forward to them every year.
Paige Witham:
Yeah, absolutely. That sounds delicious.
I'll have to make sure I get one of those this year. So let's
talk about some community wins.
What upgrade or improvement are you most proud of,
and how has it made care easier locally?
Bob Gomes:
You know there's a lot going on here. For a small hospital,
this is a gem.
This place is really a gem. And your question couldn't be more
timely.
We just installed the newest MRI in the state.
And so a lot of people are upgrading their MRIs right now,
and we've got the latest and greatest. It went live last week.
And to let the audience know the image quality is amazing.
The bore is actually larger. That's the circumference of the tube
that you're in.
So for those of us that get claustrophobic,
it's a little bit better.
And the imaging time is less than half what it normally was.
Paige Witham:
Wow.
Bob Gomes:
And so, we're blessed. We have a board that's used the money to
invest in that,
and we have that right here. And what's nice is we get to keep
people local.
They don't have to travel five hours round trip to get that type
of quality image.
They can stay right here in Harney County and get it.
Paige Witham:
Yeah, I love that. I love your point too,
about mentioning both the time and the circumference of the tube.
I'm blessed to not have to have gotten an MRI yet,
but my grandma has,
and that was one of the most anxiety inducing experiences for her
because she did not have those luxuries.
And so, you know, just hearing you say that made my little bit of
anxiety that I have over that sort of imaging kind of decrease a
bit, so that's awesome.
Samantha Yarbrough:
And our new machine also, some patients are able to go feet first
instead of head first.
So that helps reduce anxiety a lot.
And you can listen to music, which would really help me out.
I think so.
Paige Witham:
Yeah, me too.
Samantha Yarbrough:
I thought that was a really neat feature.
Bob Gomes:
That's great.
Paige Witham:
That's awesome. Let's talk about teamwork.
Can you share a teamwork story from this past year that really
sticks out in your mind?
I know we have opportunities for great teamwork stories all the
time, especially in the healthcare field.
Bob Gomes:
Yeah, you know, healthcare is about teamwork.
It takes all of us. And the real goal is to take care of those
that are taking care of our patients.
But one that stands out and it's more prevalent across the US,
and it's becoming more so is how do we
place people that don't need to be in the hospital,
but still need care?
We call it placement, and we want a safe discharge.
And we had a real difficult one recently where our team came
together.
We learned about different resources within the community,
not just here locally,
but within Central Oregon. And the team work together to be able
to place this patient there safely,
but it took a lot, and I won't go into all the details,
but our case manager,
Mary, let us do that, and she does a great job because we're very
patient focused.
But we actually even had to get the courts involved and stuff,
but we kept that patient longer than they needed to be here
because we wanted them to be safe.
And that's what we're about. So the care was over,
we couldn't do any more for them.
But we needed a safe place for them to go and the team rallied
around that.
Paige Witham:
That's awesome. How about you, Samantha?
Samantha Yarbrough:
Gosh, I think we work so great collaboratively with all the
different entities in Harney County.
I mean, I'm always talking to the chamber director or just
reaching out to other community partners to share resources.
Or I do a lot of the event planning and fundraising for the
hospital,
and we're always saying, "Hey, I had this kind of themed party
last year.
Do you want to borrow our decorations,
and we'll borrow yours this year?" Or I mean, just little things
like that all the time that we just,
resources are scarce, and I think we always kind of try to see
what we can do to share and support.
And there's going to be a mental health fair in town next week,
and the hospital is helping sponsor that with the school district
and all these different entities coming together to put that on.
Paige Witham:
So yeah, I love that. Yeah. And I love kind of your framework
there of both of your stories.
You're highlighting teamwork both within and outside of the
hospital.
And I think that's what's so important to highlight is that we
exist in our communities because we're a part of our communities.
And so being able to really rally around that idea and whether
resources are scarce or not,
that's being a good steward of the resources that you have and
making sure that you're able to use those over time.
And it's not just a one use situation,
so I love both of those.
Bob Gomes:
Yeah, and if I can add on to that.
Paige Witham:
Yeah.
Bob Gomes:
Another great example. And Samantha hits on it.
You know, the patients just aren't ours.
There's a lot of other resources,
organizations in the community that take care of the same
patients. And one I like to highlight is recently we had a high
altitude rescue on Steens Mountain.
Well, none of us could have done that alone.
It took fire. It took the sheriff's office.
It took our EMS. And those people work day in and day out,
covering over 10,000mi² to take care of
our patients. And so that's one that Samantha highlighted on our
Facebook page.
But kudos not only to our EMS crew that went up there,
but also the other resources fire,
rescue, the sheriff's office, everybody that was involved with
that saved a life.
Paige Witham:
Yeah. And that's huge. I mean, it's one of those things where
your new story feed can be crowded out with a lot of like
bad news. And so when you get these wins for the community,
it's just so awesome.
Samantha Yarbrough:
Another kind of cool thing that came out of that was not only
were they able to successfully rescue the person that fell,
but they decided, you know, we really want to beef up our
training. So they launched a four-part training series and even
brought in some people from Corvallis to help out and got all of
the different first responders involved in that.
So they've been really working on remote rescue training for the
last few months.
I think they're at part two out of four trainings now.
Paige Witham:
That's really incredible, especially because we do have such
incredible recreation opportunities around here.
And so being able to be responsible in those recreational
opportunities includes being well-trained
and having opportunities for training is huge too.
That kind of went into what we were going to talk about next,
so we'll go into innovation.
What innovations are you most excited about on the horizon?
Bob Gomes:
Well, on the horizon, but I'll tell you one we just implemented a
couple of weeks ago with the help of Saint Al's in Boise.
So it's not new, a lot of hospitals have done it,
but we just implemented what we call telestroke.
And what that does for us is they placed a robot here,
and we have multiple robots.
Healthcare's full of them, and this one really puts eyes on our
patients when they come into the emergency department with stroke
like symptoms. And what's really nice about this Saint Al's team
is they have 24/7 neuro specialists.
And the first one we didn't use the robot on,
we just called, and they picked up the phone right away. And I
think this last week we actually did use it for two stroke
patients.
And what's really nice is they help our ED doctors through that,
and then they automatically accept those patients.
So that's a great technology that's been around for a long time,
but we've just brought that here to Harney County,
and we're using it. So pretty excited about that.
Paige Witham:
That's awesome. How about you Samantha?
Samantha Yarbrough:
Well, we touched on the MRI machine,
which is very exciting.
So we got that just installed, and we're going to be rolling that
out soon.
And then I know like in our orthopedics program,
they're using some robotic technology to help with that.
So the surgeon directs it, but the robot can help get everything
very,
very precise.
Paige Witham:
I love that.
Samantha Yarbrough:
A lot of very neat things coming up.
Paige Witham:
Yeah, absolutely. And innovation,
I think we're just going to continue to see exponential growth in
that space, and I'm really excited about what that could mean for
the future of healthcare and being able to provide care locally,
especially in the example of the orthopedic robot.
That is incredible because there might be in the future some mind
that is capable of this procedure,
but their hands aren't. And now they're able to use robotic hands
in that place.
Just, you know, spitballing ideas here,
but it just, I'm so excited about the future of innovation in the
space of healthcare. So I'm going to kind of go back to what we
were talking about a little while ago.
If you had to pinpoint a partnership or series of partnerships
that made a meaningful difference,
what would you highlight?
Bob Gomes:
You know, a couple we have lots of partnerships.
We just can't do this alone out here in Harney County.
But a couple I want to highlight are our visiting specialists.
And so instead of patients always having to go to Bend or to
Boise,
the specialists come here. And the two that I'll highlight are
dermatology,
Doctor Wisco and his team. They're coming out here on a regular
basis.
You can get dermatology appointments here quicker than you can
almost anywhere else.
And they take care of patients locally.
The other one is cardiology with Saint Charles.
So they sent a provider now two providers out on a regular basis
to take care of those patients that need cardiology care right
here on site. And so those are some partnerships and
collaborations,
but we have a lot of them. But those are two that I think the
community is proud of and should know about,
and they can stay local for.
Paige Witham:
Absolutely, I love that.
Samantha Yarbrough:
Yeah, I would just echo what Bob said.
We do have quite a huge range of visiting specialists that we see
for how small and remote we are.
I think we should be really proud of that because we can offer,
you know,
things locally that we couldn't before.
And I know we're really trying to ramp up our infusion services
as well.
So we're trying to do more chemotherapy type treatments here in
house,
which means everything to our patients who don't have to travel
when they're not feeling well.
So anytime we can keep people here,
it's better for our community,
and it's better for our patient care as well.
Paige Witham:
Absolutely. Let's talk about community well-being.
And I want to hear how Harney District Hospital supports overall
community resilience.
Bob Gomes:
You know, it's a great question.
We do do a lot. Samantha can talk about some of the events.
But you know, our providers are really into wellness.
And so when you come see them, they're going to talk to you about
your labs.
They're going to talk about your annual physicals,
the type of things that you should have and what we can do to
support them as patients and being healthy in the community.
The other thing Sam hit on it is,
you know, part of the stress of living in a rural area is the
logistics of going someplace. And I think about the families that
might have to go into Bend or Boise and be able to be with a
loved one. And as we bring more and more services here,
even if they're teleservices,
it allows people to save money,
save time and the stress of it all.
And I can't imagine going someplace a couple times a week for
chemotherapy infusions.
You can stay right here and get those done now. So that helps
with resiliency quite a bit.
Paige Witham:
I think so too. Yeah, absolutely.
Samantha Yarbrough:
I think another big thing to mention is that we're one of the
largest employers in our community,
and this is a great place to work.
We do a lot for our employees to keep them happy,
and we have a lot of fun activities that we put together for
them. And I think we do a lot to invest in,
like the growth of our employees.
If they are interested in like pursuing a different pathway,
like we've had some that have come on as like they work in
environmental services, but they say,
you know, I really am interested in getting into actual,
you know, health care, patient care.
And we help them find pathways to move up through the
organization.
And I think that's something I'm very proud of when I work here,
is to see my coworkers grow and all the opportunities they've had
that maybe they started in a very part time job,
and now they're a CNA,
and they're starting to become a nurse,
and they're just moving,
moving through. I think that's an awesome how much we invest in
our individual employees even.
Paige Witham:
Absolutely. I think that's a really great highlight.
And that's something actually pretty consistent with the
conversations I've had with other hospitals is being one of the
largest employers in the area. And it's really impactful to me as
I look at the ecosystem of a healthy
community and no pun intended, right,
about healthcare being so foundational in that from actual
health and wellness, but also economic stability and
opportunities for growth,
for career training and that, you know,
hospitals employ more than doctors and nurses.
You've got a wide range of career opportunities that are
available to you.
And I just think it's a really amazing place to work.
I've seen people posting on social media and stuff about how
happy they are to be here and to be employees here,
so it speaks volumes about you guys and what you're doing in the
community.
Okay. So is there anything that you would like to highlight that
we haven't talked about yet today?
Bob Gomes:
You know, maybe a few things real quickly,
is Samantha hit on it is in healthcare,
it's a profession. And so we will invest in you,
and if you want to come here and be a CNA,
a nurse assistant, we'll put you through that school,
and we'll pay for it.
And what's nice about that is we're investing in people from
Harney County.
And what's nice for us is they have family and friends here,
and they want to stay here and things like that.
And so I think that's great. The other thing I would point your
listeners to is Samantha's done a great job on our website with a
lot of resources in the community.
So if you've got questions about where to go,
what to look for, I've even used it.
I mean, relatively new, been here a year and a half.
I've gone there to look up things.
And so she's done a great job of cataloging and putting together
a web page where you can get resources,
and that's something I think we should know about.
And the last thing I'll say is just,
you know, having been in healthcare a long time,
a lot of people don't have the experiences maybe I do.
This place is a gem. Our quality scores are great,
our patient experience scores are great.
We've got great services compared to other facilities our size,
and we should be proud of that.
Paige Witham:
Absolutely.
Bob Gomes:
So thanks for having us.
Paige Witham:
Yeah, absolutely. Samantha, anything to add?
Samantha Yarbrough:
Yeah, just kind of to build on what Bob was saying about local
people being invested in and working here.
It's also good for the patients because a lot of our patients
know their caregivers.
They know them personally. They see them out in the community.
They have a real relationship with them.
And I think that that goes so far in care because that comfort
level is just built in.
So I think you're more open with your provider.
If you feel comfortable with them,
you're going to actually tell them what's going on, and I think
you get better care.
Paige Witham:
I totally agree. You know, that was something that I came from a
bigger city,
moved to a smaller town fairly recently.
And, it's pretty incredible the amount of trust I feel with my
provider versus how I felt in a big
city is just a huge difference. And that's probably a me problem,
but it speaks to what you're saying of,
you know, these people, you know,
they're in your community. You see them at the grocery store,
or you see them at church or wherever else. And there is just
that level of comfortability and trust built in.
And I think it's a really unique and great benefit to folks that
are getting this care
locally. Well, thank you both for joining us today on the Power
Eastern Oregon Podcast.
We will talk to you next time.
Bob Gomes:
Thank you,
Samantha Yarbrough:
Thank you.