BAR HARBOR, ME — Maine Seacoast Mission partnered with [Area Interfaith Outreach (AIO) Food] Pantry & Emergency Services to send a shipment of perishable and pantry items to Matinicus [Island].
L-R: Director Douglas Cornman, Director Sharon Daley, Steward Jillian
MDIslander
Mission works to keep islanders connected, safely
March 27, 2020 by Liz Graves on News, Waterfront
BAR HARBOR — In some ways, residents of unbridged island communities are ahead of the curve with the changes brought by the virus epidemic, since they already rely on remote and online connections for important services.
But in other ways, they’re especially vulnerable.
On March 13, the team of Maine Seacoast Mission staff that usually visits islands aboard the Sunbeam (or this year, the replacement Moonbeam while work is being done on the bigger boat) decided to suspend their regularly scheduled visits.
“Each island community has asked that people not come out to the islands (so they can) make the best use of what limited resources they have on the island,” said Doug Cornman, director of island outreach and chaplain. So we want to honor that … If people start to not feel well, this would decimate an island.”
Matinicus Island. Photo by Sharon Daley, RN.
March 19, 2020
www.mainebiz.biz
Maine’s ‘unbridged’ islands hunker down
By Laurie Schreiber
Islands in Maine without bridges to the mainland are taking special steps to protect residents from the threat of coronavirus.
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“We’re taking our cues from our island communities,” [Mission President John] Zavodny said. “North Haven has taken the step of prohibiting non-island residents. Whether you agree with that decision or not, we think the spirit is a good one, of trying to self-isolate, trying to flatten the curve.”
The mission’s regularly scheduled island visits are suspended through March 31. However, the suspension doesn’t mean the mission is unavailable to island residents, he emphasized. His team is discussing ways to best support island residents during the pandemic and would like to hear their ideas.
L-R: Island Outreach Director Douglas Cornman, Island Health Director Sharon Daley.
BAR HARBOR, ME — With COVID-19 precautions in mind, the Sunbeam’s Island Services team (Douglas, Jillian, and Sharon) are suspending our regularly scheduled visits starting March 16th through March 31st. We will decide on how to best proceed as more information on the Coronavirus becomes available and we talk with islanders, island leadership, and island communities. We’ve made this decision to help flatten the curve and to keep islanders and their communities as safe and healthy as possible.
Island Services is available to you. Douglas and Sharon are discussing ways to best support you during this pandemic and would like to hear your ideas. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have immediate needs or have ideas of how we can support you and your communities.
As always, Sharon is available to work with you and your healthcare provider if you have any medical needs or concerns. Contact Douglas if you have pastoral needs and prayer requests. Contact either of us if you just need to hear a friendly voice and want to chat. We are here for you!
Contact information:
sdaley@seacoastmission.org or 207-542-9988
dcornman@seacoastmission.org or 207-479-0707
‘Sunbeam’ Captain Mike Johnson aboard the boat at Front Street Shipyard.
L-R: Island Outreach Director Douglas Cornman, Island Health Director Sharon Daley
www.fishermensvoice.com
February 2020 Volume 25, No. 2
O U T H E R E I N T H E R E A L W O R L D
Truck Calls
by Eva Murray
The history of nursing on Matinicus Island goes way back.
Sharon is on the island.
Even those of us who are pretty convinced that we don’t need anything are on Sharon Daley’s radar. She’s the registered nurse associated with the Maine Seacoast Mission—to most of us, “the Sunbeam”—and she’s the closest thing a few islanders have to a primary care provider. Checking on her island patients she’ll often just stop by to visit, or we’ll drop by aboard the Sunbeam when they’re in the harbor, to visit with her, even if we don’t need anything. That’s how health care ought to work.
At the moment the 75’ vessel Sunbeam is in the shipyard, so our pleasant visits aboard (focused largely on steward Jillian’s cookie jar) will have to wait. The ‘Beam’s telemedicine unit, where a patient on the island—in a private area aboard the boat—can interact in real time with a physician, counselor or other provider over a high-resolution video link, has changed the nature of “isolation.” Folks who don’t go to the mainland much can have greater access to medical care and advice than ever before. Still, a videoconference is not the same as a conversation with a human being, particularly when that human is a trusted friend, an experienced nurse who knows a thing or two about the real world.