Linda currently serves as Chief Medical Officer for Maine Behavioral Healthcare and Chair, Dept of Psychiatry, ME Medical Center and holds the appointment of Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Tufts School of Medicine. Durst developed a suicide screen for the U.of Arizona Health System, active in multiple quality improvement teams on suicide prevention, and has taught physicians and non-physicians in suicide assessment. She received training at the Zero Suicide Academy in Maryland, as a member of 1 of 20 teams selected internationally. She chaired the Hartford Healthcare Behavioral Health Network’s Suicide Prevention Task Force, responsible for rolling out Zero Suicide to the Hartford Healthcare Behavioral Health Network and assisting in the roll-out in the state of Connecticut. Dr. Durst was elected as a member of the American College of Psychiatrists in 2017, for her expertise in Administrative Psychiatry. Currently, Dr. Durst is serving as Executive Sponsor for the rollout of Zero Suicide at Maine Medical Center and Maine Behavioral Healthcare and is the executive sponsor for a two-million-dollar, five-year grant to facilitate the rollout of Zero Suicide in MaineHealth.

Last Friday at our new home at The Elks Club, we were fortunate to hear from Colleen Hilton, who came to us on very, very short notice as our speaker for the day. Special thanks go out to David Putnam for the effort in landing this dynamic speaker. Colleen is not only the head of Northern Light’s home health care and hospice programs but she is a third term mayor of Westbrook, serving as the city’s first female mayor.

 

As a self-proclaimed “non-politician”, Colleen has been able to corral over 500 employees as they trek across Maine each year to the tune of 3.5 million miles traveled as they care for those in need. In the wake of Covid-19, the workforce challenges have grown immensely for all health care entities. Long hours, staffing shortages, low pay, difficult physical labor, worker burnout, early retirement and even workplace violence have all forced Colleen and her staff to the brink as they work to cover our large state with the eldest population in the nation. 

 

For profit hospice centers have taken hold but the bulk of the work in home health and hospice has been shared by Maine Health and Northern Light, both of which have seen closures of facilities in the past 4 years. Hancock County, for example, now has zero hospice centers after recent closures. And Maine leads the nation in nursing home closures after a recent requirement that an RN be on duty 24/7, a mandate that causes budgets to teeter on the brink of collapse.

 

There are no easy answers or quick fixes available but, with the leadership of Colleen Hilton and others, there is hope. Training and certificate programs at our universities and community colleges are seeing an uptick as we grapple with the issues that arise from our aging populace. And, with just 20 hours of training, volunteers can be brought in to aid in many of the centers that remain viable around Maine. So, there is hope for our home health and hospice needs, especially with the leadership of someone as committed as Colleen Hilton. Photo: Patty Byers, Juliana L'Heureux, Colleen, and Dave Putnam.

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