A Modern Day Good Samaritan

By Irene M. Lagan
HERALD Staff Writer
(From the issue of 11/28/02)

We all know the story of the Good Samaritan, the traveler who stops on his journey to care for a sick man, providing him with lifesaving care. It is rare to find an individual who models her life on the parable in an almost literal way, as did Mother Teresa of Calcutta. In the Appalachian region of southwest Virginia, Sister Bernadette Kenny is a modern day Good Samaritan who, like Mother Teresa, cares for the poorest of the poor in her own backyard.

Sister Kenny is a Medical Missionary of Mary who has ministered to the health needs of the uninsured for more than 20 years. For the last 18 years, she has been the director of St. Mary’s Health Wagon, a Winnebago outfitted as a mobile medical unit which travels into five isolated Appalachian communities. The health wagon is a community-based organization that serves indigent people in the area. Roving health care has proven to be a much needed, unique and innovative means of providing medical aid to the poor and uninsured in southwest part of Virginia.

The mobile medical van has been making its rounds weekly to six sites since 1985. It began when Sister Kenny, who came to the area in 1978 as a nurse midwife, sought a way to change the plight of the poor who lacked access to health care.

"I worked in Tanzania and Ethiopia for 12 years. When I came here in 1978, I saw that people were unable to access health care, so I went to school to become a nurse practitioner. People here are as bad off as people in Africa. At least in Africa, people can go to state-run clinics. They might not get the latest antibiotic, but they receive care. In this country, you need money to buy health care," Sister Kenny said.

Sister Kenny believes that people have a right to adequate health care. Formal education, she said, is a privilege. "But, it is part of our dignity that we deserve access to health care."

In 1985, Sister Kenny purchased her first van for $1 from St. Mary Hospital in Norton, Va. The transmission on the 1978 model lasted just long enough to establish the much-needed presence of a mobile medical unit in the remote regions of Dickenson and Buchanan counties.

With an award from California-based St. Joseph’s Health Care System, Sister Kenny was able to replace the first van with a second model. When the transmission on the second van died last year, an anonymous donor offered to buy Sister Kenny a new health wagon. "This man wanted to know how much it would cost. When I told him $100,000, he told me to order it. I nearly fell off my chair."

The donor, a young man known only to Sister Kenny, did well in the stock market and wanted to donate his fortune to a worthy cause. "Although he is now struggling along with everyone else in the stock market, he is happy that he has paid for something that continues to help others," said Sister Kenny.

St. Mary’s Health Wagon now operates on a combination of funds provided by Bon Secours-St. Mary Hospital in Norton, and has become well-established as a medical outreach to the poor of the region. Three nurses practitioners and several volunteers assist Sister Kenny in her ministry.

On a weekly basis, several hundred patients visit the health wagon. Last year, Sister Kenny and her cohorts served 8,000 people in two counties with a combined population of approximately 35,000 people. The St. Mary’s Health Wagon picks up new patients on a daily basis, while the regular visits to various sites make it possible for countless others to receive ongoing care, often a problem for the uninsured.

For many of the unemployed or those with unaffordable insurance premiums, the health wagon is their only primary care provider. For the isolated and elderly, the health wagon provides more than just medication or health care. St. Mary’s Health Wagon brings a staff that specializes in the healing balm of caring and compassion.

Teresa Gardner was the first nurse practitioner to work with Sister Kenny. "I had my first baby at Bon Secours-St. Mary Hospital, and I loved the sisters there. When my baby was sick, the sisters prayed for her," Gardner said. Gardner, whose nine-year-old daughter has a brain tumor, knows the value of compassionate care. "A lot of what we do is also social work. We treat people medically, but also visit many who are isolated."

Recently, Sister Kenny arrived on site to find a woman who was four months pregnant and bleeding profusely, awaiting the van’s arrival with her husband. "It was our first case of the morning, and we were 40 miles from the nearest hospital. Her husband accidentally shot her during a dispute. He was hysterical and telling the driver to drive faster. It is hard to travel fast in the van on these mountain roads. I was trying to stop the bleeding. We thought she would die," Sister Kenny said. After her arrival at the hospital, the young woman was sent by ambulance to a trauma center. The ambulance overturned on the way. Miraculously, the woman was rescued, survived and later gave birth to a healthy baby girl.

In addition to acute care, the most common ailments are diabetes, depression, hypertension and high cholesterol. Because such problems are frequently connected to lifestyle, health education is another component of the health wagon’s ministry.

"We do a lot of health education. Diabetes and hypertension are often related to lifestyle. By going into the communities, we are informed of the real situation. We enter into their lives, and it makes it easier for people to learn how to modify their lives. When we sit in an office, we often don’t know how people struggle on a daily basis," Sister Kenny said. "We also see many generations of the same families and are able to have a greater impact on them."

Kenny is widely know in the area as an advocate for the poor. When the county cut funding for the WIC program, officials heard from Sister Kenny. "I believe in a reciprocal exchange of power," Sister Kenny said. "We are serving people without government funding, and we help the government by helping people to help themselves. We want the government to do its part."

Jim Baldwin, director of the Cumberland Plateau Planning Commission for Dickenson and Buchanan Counties, said, "We like to say that Sister Kenny commands. Everyone knows her in this area. She ministers to people, helps them behind the scenes, teaches people and gives good advice."

Sister Kenny’s views health problems as opportunities to share the light of Christ, to teach and to learn. Her vision and generosity have made a difference. The work of the health wagon earned national attention in 1998 when Sister Kenny was given the Lumen Christi award. People around the country realized the benefit of the health wagon, and the Diocese of Richmond put the health wagon forward as a light of Christ experience. The award was an occasion to celebrate the many lives that have been touched, renewed and filled with hope by the St. Mary’s Health Wagon outreach.  

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