Christmas Curbside Donation Drive Starts Next Weekend:

Saturday, December 17th – Saturday, December 24th!

St. Anthony’s 24^th Annual Christmas Curbside Donation Drive begins on Saturday, December 17^th. St. Anthony Foundation staff and volunteers, wearing easily identifiable red jackets, will take delivery of food, clothing, and monetary donations at curbside, so donors won’t even have to leave their cars! Donated items are distributed free of charge to San Francisco’s most needy residents.

Your donation of NEW SOCKS, clean and ready-to-wear clothing, canned and dried foods are all much needed and appreciated! And if you’ve been working on hand knit scarves as holiday gifts to our guests, bring them in!

WHEN: December 17th-24th, 2011 – Weekends from 9-3 & Weekdays from 8-6

WHERE: St. Anthony Foundation - 105 Golden Gate @ Jones

NEEDED ITEMS:

Clothing
We need all kinds of clothing for men, women, and children – our most critical needs are for the following items:

Socks, Shoes
Underwear
Winter coats
Jackets
Hats

Monetary Donations

St. Anthony’s is happy to accept cash or checks for donation during Curbside and is prepared to issue receipts onsite for tax purposes.

ITEMS WE CANNOT ACCEPT:

Empty clothes hangers
Knick knacks
Used toys
Children’s car seats
Furniture
Medical equipment
Dirty, stained or torn items
Books and magazines
Exercise/sports equipment
Housewares
Computers, electronics

If you have any questions about donations, please call us at (415) 241-2600.

And in case you’d like to volunteer and join us for the holidays, call the St. Anthony Holiday Line at 415-592-2829. We look forward to seeing you!

Today, Diabetes Hands Foundation announced the donation of $75,000 to six diabetes charities that help people with diabetes in need in the United States and Latin America. The money was raised through a grassroots online diabetes awareness campaign called Big Blue Test, supported by Roche Diabetes Care.

The Big Blue Test takes place every November leading up to World Diabetes Day on Nov. 14. The campaign reinforces the importance of exercise in managing diabetes. Through Big Blue Test, Diabetes Hands Foundation (DHF) called on people with diabetes to test their blood sugar, get active for 14 minutes or more, test again, and share the results at Bigbluetest.org. In the last three years, exercise decreased participants’ blood sugar level between 15 and 20 percent.

Roche’s support enabled DHF to provide critical funding to six nonprofit organizations. Five of those nonprofits are focused on helping underserved areas with a high incidence of diabetes in the United States. An additional grant will support the International Diabetes Federation’s Life for a Child Programme for the organization’s work in Latin America. As a result of reaching 8,000 entries in the Big Blue Test, Diabetes Hands Foundation granted the following:

• $25,000 to International Diabetes Federation’s Life For a Child program.
• $10,000 to Moundville Medical Clinic, Tuscaloosa, Alabama
• $10,000 to LIFT For Teens/Walk and Play For Wellness in San Rafael, CA
• $10,000 to University of Colorado Denver
• $10,000 to St. Anthony Medical Clinic, St. Anthony Foundation in San Francisco, CA
• $10,000 to Pecos Valley Medical Center, Inc. Pecos NM

“Because of these six extraordinary charities, thousands of people will have the insulin, supplies and care they need to survive,” said Manny Hernandez, founder of TuDiabetes and President of the Diabetes Hands Foundation (DHF).  “I am honored and humbled for DHF and the partners that helped us in the Big Blue Test to have a role in something so important.”

DHF will also share the anonymized results submitted by people with diabetes with two academic research groups, to help us analyze the data and learn more from The Big Blue Test. For more details, visit www.BigBlueTest.org.

St. Anthony’s 24th Curbside Holiday Donation Drive kicks off on Saturday, November 19th. St. Anthony Foundation staff and volunteers, wearing easily identifiable red jackets, will take delivery of food, clothing, and monetary donations at curbside, so donors won’t even have to leave their cars! Donated items are distributed free of charge to San Francisco’s most needy residents.

Your donation of turkeys, clean and gently worn clothing, canned and dried foods are all much needed and appreciated!

WHEN:
November 19th-24th AND December 17th-24th

• Weekdays from 8-6
• Weekends from 9-3

WHERE:
St. Anthony Foundation
105 Golden Gate @ Jones

NEEDED ITEMS:

Clothing
We need all kinds of clothing for men, women, and children – our most critical needs are for the following items:

Socks, Shoes
Underwear
Winter coats
Jackets
Hats

Monetary Donations
St. Anthony’s is happy to accept cash or checks for donation during Curbside and is prepared to issue receipts onsite for tax purposes.

Other
We also need these items:

Shopping bags – with handles
Blankets, comforters, sleeping bags
Luggage, bags, backpacks
Toiletries – new only, please
Towels, washcloths
Stuffed animals – good condition only
Children’s toys – new only, please
Strollers – in good condition
Canes – not crutches, walkers, wheelchairs

Items We Cannot Accept
Empty clothes hangers
Knick knacks
Used toys
Children’s car seats
Furniture
Medical equipment
Dirty, stained or torn items
Books and magazines
Exercise/sports equipment
Housewares
Computers, electronics

If you have any questions about donations, please call us at (415) 241-2600.

And in case you’d like to volunteer and join us for the holidays, call the St. Anthony Holiday Line at 415-592-2829. We look forward to seeing you this holiday season!

The Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure is the largest series of 5K runs and fitness walks in the world. The Race not only raises awareness, celebrates breast cancer survivors, and honors those who have lost their battle with the disease, it also raises significant funding for the fight against breast cancer.

This year some of that funding goes to St. Anthony’s Medical Clinic to help low-income women in the Tenderloin get one-stop breast health visits: mammograms, gynecological exams, cervical cytology. Anything that women in particular need to watch to stay healthy and whole.

Women who come to St. Anthony Medical Clinic for healthcare often have to choose between a doctor visit and a day’s work, between a sick child and their own health. St. Anthony’s will make it easier for women by holding quarterly women’s health days where women can take care of many examinations and tests all at once. A woman who misses one women’s health day to meet other needs can try for the next event.

If you join the Komen Foundation in the Race for the Cure in San Francisco, you help St. Anthony’s, and over a dozen of our community partner organizations, in the fight against breast cancer in low-income women.

You can sign up at the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure web site at www.komensf.org

Komen SF Race for the Cure
Sunday, September 25, 2011
The Embarcadero, starting and finishing at the Ferry Building

St. Anthony Medical Clinic will thank you. We thank the Susan G. Komen Foundation for supporting low-income women in the Tenderloin.

Last month we announced that Dr. Ana Valdes, Medical Director of St. Anthony’s Clinic, was a finalist for a Healthcare Hero Award. It’s high time to announce that she won.

The San Francisco Business Times launched the new awards to honor professionals who go above and beyond to make the Bay Area healthier by delivering quality care, advocating for patients, innovating new technology or educating the community about health issues.

Dr. Ana was recognized for increasing healthcare access to the underserved. Interestingly enough, one of her achievements that most interested her healthcare peers was synchronizing St. Anthony’s electronic medical records with the coding system at San Francisco General Hospital. This made St. Anthony’s the city’s first low-income clinic to do so. It sounds technical, but coordinating with SF General means that all the doctors who serve a low-income patient have the same information. A more complete history means better care and more possibility for progress.

The magazine also cited the brand new breast health program Dr. Ana has started in the Clinic, based on an outreach model she created for diabetes patients and later for asthma patients. All three programs help patients who have a hard time keeping up with their healthcare come into the Clinic, check on progress, and make a plan for managing disease. (more…)

Dr. Ana Valdez is a finalist for a Healthcare Heroes Award. Sponsored by the San Francisco Business Times, the new awards honor professionals who go above and beyond to make the Bay Area healthier by delivering quality care, advocating for patients, innovating with new technology or educating the community about health issues. Recipients will be announced at the awards ceremony on July 27.

Dr. Ana does all of the above. She has made St. Anthony’s Medical Clinic into a medical home for those who need it most: the uninsured and underinsured, the working poor, new immigrants, and low-income families with children.

Her experience practicing Family Medicine in the American Southwest, Mexico, and Guatemala prepared her for St. Anthony’s. She knows how to provide high-quality care with limited resources . Her approach makes rigorous use of counseling, health education, and peer support. St. Anthony patients participate in their own care.

Dr. Ana has taken a “go get ‘em” approach to inviting diabetic patients who have trouble keeping current with their care to come in for a visit with a doctor. The Clinic organizes 4 Diabetes Days a year. They telephone all of our Diabetic patients who haven’t been in for a while to come in for a check-up, treatment, and counseling. On the same day, they invite the neighborhood to come in for screening and Q & A about Diabetes.

It started as an experiment and it worked so well that the Clinic started a series of Asthma Days to do the same thing with asthma patients: 4 Asthma Days a year, calls to the asthma patients they haven’t seen in a while, and an invitation to neighbors who might become new patients. Soon, thanks to the Susan G. Komen Foundation, they’ll replicate the whole model for women’s breast health to prevent and identify breast cancer and other diseases early on.

Whatever happens on July 27, Dr. Ana is a healthcare hero to her colleagues, and to 3400 people who make the Clinic their medical home. We’re grateful to the San Francisco Business times for honoring Dr. Ana.

Check out the SF Business Times for a profile of Dr. Ana and the other finalists.

Fr. Floyd Lotito would often say St. Anthony’s Dining Room was a social barometer that signaled larger changes in our city. Although we do not receive government funding, we feel the impact of related cuts to crucial services in our city. The number of meals served in St. Anthony’s Dining Room spiked a whopping 9% in March 2011 compared to March 2010. On the busiest day in March, we served a total of 3415 meals, up 200 meals from the year before. (Click here to read our Executive Director Shari Roeseler’s moving OpEd article published in the San Francisco Chronicle on May 4th) As San Francisco prepares to close a $380 budget gap, we are braced to see our numbers continue to rise. We invite you, our faithful volunteers and donors, to be a part of the solution. Come down and volunteer a day in the Dining Room or post a message in the comment box letting other readers, community members, and lawmakers know why it’s so important for San Francisco to maintain a critical safety net for our most vulnerable citizens.

St. Anthony Foundation Executive Director Shari Roeseler appears in today’s San Francisco Chronicle with a moving Open Forum piece concerning potential budget cuts that would affect low-income families, seniors, people with disabilities and homeless seeking employment.

Click here to read the article and leave your message in the comment forum below.

A year after the heavily debated prohibition against sitting or lying on San Francisco sidewalks was proposed, police have begun to enforce the law. The debate continues with supporters of the law claiming it is working and opponents claiming that it targets individuals who are homeless or mentally ill.

The first week’s numbers indicate that police in the city have handed out 75 warnings and eight citations. Citations range from $50 to $500 and potentially even jail time.

“The emphasis is not to cite, but to inform and offer services,” said police spokesman Sgt. Mike Andraychak to the Associated Press on Sunday.

Many residents of the areas Police have begun enforcing the new law have their doubts. Bruce Wolfe, vice president of the Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Council, doesn’t think the law will work and believes it to infringe upon civil rights.

“It seems a little bit overextended, overreaching. I just find to make everybody have to be on their two feet moving and walking seems very odd for a city to demand,” Wolfe said. “That it would have this huge drastic effect on changing the social landscape of the city, I just don’t see it.”

SF Giants Inspire Community Support by Serving Monumental Meal

As area nonprofits brace for continued budget cuts and a potential housing setback for veterans, St. Anthony Foundation prepares to serve its 37 millionth meal. Between 11 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. on Tuesday, April 12, St. Anthony’s will ‘momentarily pause’ the usual service to honor the significant moment with San Francisco Giants players, celebrating a ‘giant’ contribution to the community.

St. Anthony’s has provided unwavering support for the hungry and homeless for 60 years. Advancing upon this milestone, community support is what’s celebrated because it is that which has made possible these years of service. At the same time, the organization is also humbled by the prospect for increasing need.

“Out of approximately 2600 daily meals we provide, nearly one quarter of them are to veterans,” said Shari Roeseler, Executive Director for St. Anthony’s. “As we approach this significant milestone, we’re also planning for what could result from reduced veteran housing vouchers and government funding for other pillar San Francisco organizations. Because we’re privately supported, we often pick up where others are limited, so community building is even more critical for St. Anthony’s at this time.”

Veteran’s services are nothing new to St. Anthony’s. In 1950, the Foundation was established to provide support in an economy still recovering from World War II. Today, with veterans returning home from recent unrest, the road to re-entry is more challenging as benefits are reduced and the need for services has become more pronounced.

According to the National Coalition for the Homeless, two trends are largely responsible for the continued rise in homelessness:  A growing shortage of affordable rental housing and simultaneous increase in poverty. Our current ongoing recession, compounded with a lack of veteran’s housing vouchers will most certainly impact our nonprofit infrastructure.

“As we honor our 37 millionth meal and our 60th anniversary this fall, we continue to look ahead and prepare for an increase in the need for our services.  With the help of the community, St. Anthony’s will serve our 40 millionth meal in our new Dining Room, which we hope will open in 2014,” said Roeseler.