Inside Duke Medicine
Walltown Clinic in tune with teens
posted September 18th, 2008Walltown Neighborhood Clinic, a service of Duke Community Health and Lincoln Community Health Center, has launched a new clinical service for Durham teens at its 815 Broad St. location.
On Sept. 11, a Duke pediatric nurse practitioner started seeing teens 18 and younger between 4 and 7 p.m. each Thursday at the clinic.
The new service is open to any teen from Durham County, not just those from the Walltown neighborhood. Charges for care will follow the sliding-fee scale used at Lincoln. No patient will be denied care based on the ability to pay.
“Adolescents in general are an underserved population, and recent data on Durham teens is sobering,” says Fred Johnson, director of clinical services in the Duke Division of Community Health, citing statistics on high levels of teen risk-taking behavior and emotional problems.
The Division of Community Health operates a wellness clinic inside Southern High School, and Lincoln operates a wellness clinic inside Hillside High School. But Durham County teens from other high schools and other Durham students also need care as well as preventive services, testing and counseling. Thus the expansion of services at Walltown Neighborhood Clinic.
“We’re hoping this ‘clinic inside a clinic’ with nurse practitioner Anne Derouin will be where teens go to get prevention as well as treatment services with a provider who has long experience working with Durham teens,” Johnson said.
Duke Community Health operates another neighborhood clinic in the Community and Family Life and Recreation Center at Lyon Park, operated in conjunction with Lincoln, as well as wellness centers at E.K. Powe, George Watts and Glenn elementary schools. A new neighborhood clinic is scheduled to open next August in the former Holton School on Driver Street as part of its conversion into a vocational high school and community center.