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Shodair Children's Hospital reaches out to Havre

Shodair's Children's Hospital is not a hospital for children to get stitches or operations. It's a place where children and adolescents with deep trauma scars go to heal.

A reception was held Tuesday afternoon at Northern Montana Hospital where representatives from the Helena-based treatment center spoke to visitors about the facility and the type of work the center has been doing for more than 100 years.

"A lot of people know the name Shodair but don't know what we do," said Alana Listoe, director of community relations. It's not uncommon for the patients at Shodair to have been flown in or rushed in by ambulance, on the heels of a suicidal episode, or other emotional or psychological breakdowns.

Shodair is a nonprofit, nondenominational treatment center that provides acute and residential psychiatric treatment to children and adolescents, as well as genetic services to people of all ages. It serves patients from all over Montana.

Eighty percent of the hospital's patients are on Medicaid, Listoe, said, which means the treatment center receives 40 cents on the dollar from those patients.

"We provide $6 million in care to disadvantaged families," Listoe said.

The facility has 84 beds split up into three age ranges, elementary, middle school and high school. Twenty of the beds, Listoe said, are for patients who need to be stabilized after a major crisis.

Katie Hanson is a registered nurse and the house supervisor at the center. She has been at Shodair more than three years. She walks the floor - she talks to the patients, and she makes sure other nurses and employees are doing their job.

"Our kids aren't hospital kids," Hanson said. "They don't look sick."

Most kids at Shodair have emotional or psychological ills, sometimes both, Hanson added.

The job can be exhausting, she said. The things she likes about it are also the things she doesn't.

"The stories about the things the kids have to endure," Hanson said, are things she doesn't like, but "it's also what I love most about them. They are tough, they are resilient, they are real because they don't have anything to hide behind."

The job can be abusive, Hanson added. She's been kicked by some of the kids in there.

The 12-and-up kids tend to be suicidal, while those under 12 tend to be aggressive, Hanson said. They are there because they've had trauma, or they have genetic issues that result in problems.

Shodair also provides genetic services. A team composed of a doctors who specialize in genetic and a certified genetic counselor provide services like diagnostic evaluations,  care coordination and risk assessment. A licensed clinical psychologist provides neuropsychological assessments.

Shodair genetics team collaborate with specialists, hospitals and providers to recommend and initiate appropriate metabolic and genetic testing.

Shodair receives funding from a variety of sources including balloons sold in the signature Children's Miracle Network balloon drive.

Being part of the Montana's Children Miracle Network Hospital helps when it comes to resources, Listoe said. All money from Montana Chidren's Miracle Network events go to Shodair.

Fundraisers this year include events at IHOP, Dairy Queen, Ace Hardware, Montana credit unions, Walmart and Sam's Club.

The hospital also relies heavily on funds provided by donors.

Shodair's story started in the 19th century.

"In 1896, thousands of orphaned children found themselves homeless at the end of the train tracks in Helena, Montana," an insert about the treatment center brochure says. "They came from the east and the south, shipped west on 'orphan trains' in hopes of finding permanent families because many were the lone survivors of immigrants coming to America in hopes of new opportunities."

Shodair started as a children's hospital and has evolved to meet changing needs, changing from an orphanage to a medical facility. It was the first facility in Montana to treat children with polio, later became the first in Montana with a department of medical genetics, and the first with a chemical dependency unit dedicated to adolescents.

As more treatments became available in other facilities Shodair has shifted its focus, now focusing on psychiatric treatment of children and adolescents, in both acute and residential facilities.

For more information about Shodair, visit its website at https://shodair.org or call the hospital at 406-444-7500.

 

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