Episode 12

Overview:

This is episode number twelve, and today we dive into an amazing conversation with our very own Board of Directors member, Dr. Helene Nau, a board-certified Family Practitioner and Founder of Health 360 Direct Primary Care in Hollywood, FL. A Practice with the mission of delivering affordable and accessible quality care to families. Dr. Aunty Helene, as many of her teenage patients call her, moved to the United States in 2010 from Haiti, where she built from the ground up and ran the only emergency room in her country. She was the only trained emergency medical provider on the island until the devastating earthquake on January 12, 2010. Her focus throughout the years has been to deliver care to those who otherwise would not have access to it due to their immigration or financial status. She is a disruptive innovator that is not afraid of challenges and believes healthcare is a right for every person. She has been the recipient of many awards, including the Pearl of Nursing Award from Pearls of Life Women Foundation in 2020, which is where our CEO Jean-Pierre Louis was led to recruit her to our Board of Directors. From her impactful collaboration within our Board to her work on the ground in Haiti with capracare, she’s instrumental in our movement toward accessible healthcare. Our conversation was a breath of fresh air, and I hope you all enjoy this episode as much as I did.

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More of the overview on Dr Helene Nau:

Dr. Hélène Nau moved to the United States in 2010 from Haiti, where she built from the ground up and ran the only emergency room in her country. She was the only trained emergency medical provider on the island until the devastating earthquake on January 12, 2010. She earned her BSN Magna Cum Laude from Chamberlain College of Nursing in 2015, pursued her MSN with a concentration in Family Medicine at Chamberlain University and graduated in 2017 with distinction. She completed her DNP at Frontier University in March 2020. Dr. Hélène Nau is a John Maxwell Certified Coach, Teacher, Trainer and Speaker who provides leadership, mentoring and perspective. She believes in adding value to others and being an instrument of care. An emergency RN, first responder and medical reserve corps for Broward County and Miami-Dade since 2009, she is Advanced Trauma, Acute Care And Basic Life Support certified. She has always served in critical environments and natural disaster-affected sites. She is the recipient of the Volunteer of the Year Award in Broward County in 2014 and 2015 and the Pearl Of Nursing Award from Pearls of Life Women Foundation in 2020. She is a Board Member for CapraCare, a non-profit organization dedicated to developing sustainable health programs for children and their families living in Haiti.

Her focus is to deliver care to those who otherwise would not have access to it due to their immigration or financial status. She is an outspoken cancer fighter who promotes early detection. She is a disruptive innovator, bold in her moves and decisions to implement change.She opened her practice HEALTH360 with the mission to deliver affordable and accessible quality care. Keeping you and your family healthy is her mission. Her areas of expertise are Pediatrics, Women’s Health, Men’s Health, Adult Medicine, Geriatrics, Alternative Medicine and Emergency Medicine. In her spare time, she volunteers at NeuroFit360, a neurological recovery facility dedicated to spinal cord and traumatic brain injuries, where she dons multiple hats. She is in charge of human resources, health maintenance monitoring, X-ray and MRI reading. She administers IV therapy at NeuroFit360 to both the neurologically injured clients and high-performance athletes.She is a member of the Emergency Nurses Association, Haitian-American Nurses Association, Black Nurse Practitioners of Palm Beach County, AANP and Sigma  Theta Tau International Honor Society . She is a board-certified Family Practitioner. The most important people in her life, however, call her Mom.

Episode Highlights:​​

• Introduction by Host-Marielis Figueroa (0:01)

• Dr. Helene Nau shares with our community what she would like them to know about her. (4:44)

• Our audience may not know yet, but Dr.Helene Nau is also identified as "Wonder Woman." She tells us the story behind the reference to "Wonder Woman" and how she got that name. (7:39) 

• Dr.Helene has been on capracare’s Board since July 2020, but her partnership with capracare started before. She shares her experience on how she got connected to capracare and what made her look at capracare as a trusted partner to lock arms with. (10:23)  

• In our pre-talk, Dr.Helene mentioned that her approach to work is doing little things at her level that make a global impact. We tend to think that because we don’t have a lot to give, we cannot help. Dr. Helene has proven this idea wrong many times. (15:20)

• She shares with our community the story of the traveling microscope (to Haiti), as an example (13:10)

• Dr.Helene Nau recently went on a  trip to Haiti, with the purpose of providing mobile health care service, training capracare medical staff, and conducting cervical cancer screenings (with the Haiti medical staff). (11:50)

• She tells us a bit more about cervical cancer in Haiti; Why has capracare taken on this health issue; and How is the organization planning to eradicate cervical cancer in Haiti. (12:10)

• We are happy to have Dr.Helene Nau on our team at capracare as an Advisory Board Member, given her experience on the board and traveling to Haiti with capracare, Dr.Helene shares her goals for the organization in 2023 and 2024. (47:53)

• Dr. Helene has found resistance to her idea that patients should pay what they can afford for medical attention, which is also capracare’s approach for our patients in Haiti. She expands her views on the importance of having equity in healthcare accessibility, especially in rural areas in Haiti like the areas capracare serves. (16:35) 

• During our pre-talk, Dr.Helene mentioned that she likes demystifying health issues; she likes for them to make sense. As a disruptive innovator, she further explains how she hopes to expand her mission which includes capracare. (17:13)

• Dr.Helene was in Haiti when the earthquake happened in 2010. She relives what her experience was like. (22:33) 

• ***PSA/Call to Action: Become a ChangeMaker @capracare.org/donate (33:25)

• Dr.Helene Nau practices in her private practice in Florida. (51:04)

• We have reached our final wrap-up question: At capracare, we believe in the power of the word Courage and its profound effect on our identity as an organization; Dr.Helene Nau's one word she would use to describe capracare and why. (55:30)

• Final thoughts (58:44)