POTSDAM -- Canton-Potsdam Hospital’s Health Coach Program has expanded to include pre-health students enrolled at Clarkson University.

The program already involves those enrolled at St. Lawrence University and SUNY Potsdam.

Health coaches act as liaisons between healthcare providers and patients who have hard-to-manage chronic diseases such as heart failure or diabetes, according to CPH officials.

“This program is mutually beneficial to the students and to our patient population,” said Adriana Quiroga-Garcia, population health manager at CPH. “The students gain valuable knowledge of chronic disease management and holistic interventions that keep people healthy at home and out of the hospital. Patients gain skills that can sustain their health and help them function better through their chronic disease.”

Once matched with an appropriate patient, each health coach works with a patient in his or her home "to promote wellness, assist in goal-setting, and teach chronic disease management techniques," CPH said. That can include learning to tell the patient when his or her symptoms are reaching a critical stage. Student coaches make two phone calls to the patient and one in-person visit per week, and are in constant communication with the patient’s healthcare team, according to hospital officials.

CPH says they have set a goal to improve the population’s health, consistent with the mission of its parent corporation, St. Lawrence Health System, by increasing access to care and reducing unnecessary hospital readmissions and emergency room visits.

The program began in 2014 and has since grown to include 35 students and 14 patients. David B. Acker, FACHE, the hospital’s president and CEO, is one of the program’s instructors, as is Susan B. Hodgson, vice president of quality and patient safety and the hospital’s chief compliance officer.

Other instructors include Quiroga-Garcia, Patricia Ellis, a nurse practitioner who works primarily with patients who have heart failure, and Ellen Nichols, assistant director of Quality and Case Management.

For more information about the Health Coach Program at Canton-Potsdam Hospital, contact Adriana Quiroga-Garcia at 261-5610 or 261-5612.