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Ohio Valley Health Center Gala honorees announced

STEUBENVILLE -- While the Ohio Valley Health Center's gala is a fundraiser to help the nonprofit meet medical gaps for the area's uninsured and underinsured, it also is occasion to single out those who aid in that mission.

This year's 17th-annual fundraiser will be held April 30 at St. Florian Event Center in Wintersville to the theme "Hats Off to OVHC -- Hope, Health and Healing."

With a Kentucky Derby theme, the gala begins with a "Mint Julep" hour at 5 p.m. and prizes for the best dressed couple, the most creative hat and the best all-around hat.

The dinner starts at 6 p.m. Tickets are $65 per person, with the deadline to purchase them being April 21. For information, to purchase tickets or to be a sponsor, visit ovhealthcenter.org or call (740) 283-2856.

The awards presentation is a key part of the program with Value Leader Pharmacy in Wintersville the community partner honoree; the late Jerry John as the posthumous medical honoree recipient; and the Rev. Clint Quillen as the volunteer of the year.

Quillen, who is married to Ann Quillen, the health center's executive director, helps write grants.

"I probably edit almost all the grants and I've helped write a lot of the grants," he said. "The medical providers, they've done some of the grants, but that's kind of my area of volunteering down here, and for me, I like it because it's outside of the church, but it's a mission of helping people and doing good in the community, and I can use some of the gifts that I have in that way."

Helping to write grants was a natural progression for Quillen, pastor of Wintersville Methodist Church, as he had assisted Ann, not so much a fan of that task, in editing her attempts.

"I've always been pretty good at writing and basically, Ann did not like doing grant writing," he said.

"It started out editing my grants, and this last year, he has done a lot of the writing because there are so many aspects of this job now, so he is gracious and now he is very familiar with the activities of the clinic and having written a few of the grants, he's well versed in what we do," she said.

Quillen described her husband as a "very gifted writer."

"Just as a pastor you have to write your messages every Sunday and study, and then his doctorate project was 453 pages. It's such a nice thing for him to get to use an area where it's his gift, to be able to write and interpret and to help me express what we want to do here at the clinic. We always have been a good team -- I'm the idea girl and he's the detail man and helps make it happen," she said.

The help and spousal support works both ways as Clint noted Ann's pitches in in multiple ways at the church.

Last year, grants to the tune of $200,000 were awarded. Since 2008, when the clinic first opened, it has received close to $1 million in grant money for programs. "That's pretty impressive," she said.

"We've been in ministry together for 39 years, and ministry is so much about planting seeds and building relationships, and then you come here (to the health center) and you literally are Jesus' hands and feet because they're (patients) hopeless, helpless, they don't know what to do, and you treat them with dignity and respect, you get them a good physical, you get a treatment plan they can manage, you help them manage that treatment plan, you get them the medication and the labs," she said.

"They may leave here different that day, so within an hour's time, an hour and a half, whatever it is, you've changed that person's life in this very condensed amount of time, so it's a powerful ministry, and it's such a gift to be a part of somebody's life like that, to know you made that kind of an impact or the work that you do with this collective group of people knowing that," she added.

Curt Virtue, co-owner of the TriState Medical Group and pharmacist in charge at Value Leader Pharmacy, which opened Aug. 1, 2013, at 200 Luray Drive, Wintersville, has been a part of the health center's mission since it first opened its doors about 17 years ago as the Jefferson County Fourth Street Health Center in downtown Steubenville.

"Originally, that's when we became involved with helping with access to medications, and through a wonderful partnership/relationship with Dr. Pervaiz Rahman, we've been able to supply medications and ancillary products -- blood pressure cuffs and some other things aside from medications -- to the clinic," he said.

"We're very respectful of everything they do at the clinic -- the people that they service -- it's a remarkable void that they fill," Virtue commented. "We have a lot of respect for their mission, and we're just happy to be a part of it."

"We are grateful for their support in so many ways," Quillen said of Value Leader Pharmacy's help. "They have provided medications, but they also help us supply blood glucose monitors and test strips for our diabetic patients and pressure monitors for our hypertensive patients. We recently through grant funding also purchased nebulizers and medications for people who have asthma -- those are like the ancillary products -- but the biggest support is making sure we have medications available for our basic patient needs such as diabetes, and hypertension and high cholesterol and basic over-the-counter medications as well."

"We keep a supply on hand and through Dr. Rahman, who purchases a lot of those basic medications for us, Value Pharmacy discounts those medications for us and we keep our medication room functioning very well, providing almost half a million dollars in medication each year," she continued.

Quillen anticipates center help will be even more in demand with "the unwinding of Medicaid," and the help from Value Leader Pharmacy is vital.

"We are going to see an increase in our patient numbers who are losing their Medicaid coverage and will now be uninsured or underinsured and seeking assistance with medication and with physical exams, so we know that the need for this working relationship is very important," she said. "We know between 5 million and 14 million new uninsured people in the United States will be without insurance beginning as soon as May 11. The letters have all gone out to patients announcing they're going to be losing their services."

Gala proceeds, she noted, help the center fill gaps and voids, providing patients with "high-quality care, high-quality medications and the support that they need to just live their daily lives.

"We can call Curt for specialty medications and we've been getting some certain things at a discounted price that we actually pay for our patients to get, so it's a good working relationship and valuable and necessary for the life of the clinic and the care that we provide," Quillen said, adding that Value Leader deserves to be singled out

"It's been 17 years of their involvement, and we couldn't do it without their support so we're just really glad we're getting this opportunity to recognize them for the valuable services they provide," she said.

"We greatly appreciate this opportunity to be recognized and enjoy our relationship," Virtue said." It's been a wonderful relationship. We're looking forward to continuing it in the future."

Gerald "Jerry" John is being posthumously honored as the center's medical honoree.

John, who died July 26 at the age of 75, and at one time had served as director of pharmacy at Ohio Valley Hospital, became a volunteer with the health center in 2022 after having participated in a brief tour of the center.

"It was a reunion of sorts," explained Ann Quillen, "as Jerry met some of the volunteer medical providers here that day who had worked together with him at Trinity Health System years ago. They were all happy to see each other again, and from that day on, Jerry volunteered every Tuesday in our medication dispensary until he unexpectedly passed on. Jerry never missed a day, and he was so good to our staff, volunteers and patients.

"Jerry was smart, insightful and a very conscientious pharmacist. Always a humble, quiet, kind and unassuming gentleman, Jerry was a hard worker and very dependable," she said. "He loved good coffee, and he definitely enjoyed the family-style meals shared at the health center each week when medical providers are seeing patients."

Quillen said that even though John's time as a volunteer was brief, his impact was lasting.

"He made a big impression, and he is greatly missed by our staff and volunteers," she said. "The board of directors believes it was only appropriate to present this award to Jerry posthumously. We know, without a doubt, that he would have been a volunteer at OVHC for years to come, and we want his family and friends to know that his work and time spent at OVHC was valued and deeply appreciated."

In its history, the health center has served more than 4,000 individual patients of the Ohio Valley, providing more than 23,000 medical visits all at no cost to the patient. It operates on donations, contributions, grants and from gala proceeds, which account for more than one-third of its operational budget.