In 2008, Grande Ronde Hospital was able to establish a Community Benefit Subcommittee (CBC) to further our social responsibility to the community because we are a 501©3 not-for-profit organization. For the past 13 years, this committee (composed of community representatives, as well as members of our hospital staff and our Board of Trustees) has worked to distribute assistance to our community partners in the form of grant funding earmarked for improving community health and wellness.

The CBC developed our community benefit program believing that by investing in our community, it benefits all of us. Serving the needs of our community has never stopped at the hospital’s doors. We wholeheartedly believe that charity begins at home, and we still serve our community with the same passion and pioneer spirit that founded this hospital 114 years ago.

Every three years, the CBC conducts a Community Health Needs Assessment (CHNA) to discover what our residents believe are the unmet priority health needs in Union County. The most recent one was just completed this fall and the CBC is now working through that wealth of information, along with other primary and secondary data, to help us determine how we can best help our community and address some of those unmet needs for the next three years.

Working together with our community partners and other agencies over the past three years, based upon the results of the 2018 CHNA, we are proud to highlight some of our efforts here. We believe they speak to the diversity of our programs, partnerships and reach. For more information on the hundreds of programs we have supported or initiated over the years, please visit our community benefits page at grh.org.

The Union County Lactation Support Program was started in July of 2020 with community partners including the Center for Human Development, the Babies First Program, the Women, Infants and Children Nutrition Program, the Eastern Oregon Coordinated Care Organization and the Northeast Oregon Network. GRH supported this program by creating a new position. GRH now has a Registered Nurse certified in lactation consulting located in our Family Birthing Center. Our RN sees both inpatients and outpatients for breastfeeding support; as well as a wide array of complications related to breastfeeding.

GRH provided a community grant of $10,000 to the Northeast Oregon Regional Food Bank through Community Connection of Northeast Oregon for the purchase of a freezer/cooler for the new regional food bank.

GRH provided a community grant of $5,000 to Growing Community Roots for their 2021 summer farm program for challenged youth in Union County. The target population for this program is at risk youth ages 8 – 12. Based on the principles of Trauma Informed Care (TIC), the program provides acceptance and safety, while supporting connections with nature and people. These efforts can help heal trauma, and promote social, emotional and academic growth by building resilience.

In December of 2020, GRH started the Innovative Strategies for Chronic Pain program and the Toolkit for Behavioral Health Management program. Both are designed to teach participants how to manage their conditions. In January 2020, we hosted Mental Health First Aid USA for adults in the community through a partnership with the National Council for Behavioral Health.

Launched in 2017, we continue to support our CHARMS (Children and Recovering Mothers) program. The mission of CHARMS is to help at-risk mothers have healthy birth outcomes, which are more likely when women obtain prenatal care early during pregnancy, consistently complete their prenatal visits, receive medication assisted therapy (MAT) and participate in substance abuse counseling. At program completion, the goal of a CHARMS participant is to maintain sobriety throughout pregnancy, deliver a healthy baby, engage in a designated treatment plan and discharge with their baby to a safe and healthy home environment. CHARMS provides this recovery pathway that often begins in our Women’s and Children’s Clinic, in conjunction with our Family Birthing Center.