Black River Memorial Hospital, Black River Falls, 2024 Community Benefits
Mental Wellness Walk-A-Thon Program
Mental health can be a difficult topic to tackle, no matter what age you are. Black River Memorial Hospital’s Mental Wellness Walk-A-Thon is a community educational event that aims to create opportunities to talk about mental health in a fun, low-stress environment suitable for families, individuals, and couples alike.
Established in 2023, the Mental Wellness Walk-A-Thon tackles the mental health portion of the community health needs assessment and the hospital’s community health improvement plan to connect with community partners. This Walk-A-Thon features different mental wellness walking “stations” where community members can stop by and learn about various aspects of wellness, including suicide and self-harm, balancing emotions, music and sound therapy, nutrition, breathing, artistic expressions, physical activities such as yoga, kickboxing and Zumba, interactive animal stations, and local resources for phone assistance and county support.
These stations, along with the walk itself, are free to attend. While attendance at each station is encouraged through the use of “passports” participants can use to mark off each station they visit, the casual nature of the walking route ensures that participants can select which stations suit their needs or interests best and visit accordingly.
While the Walk-A-Thon debuted in 2023, over 200 people attended, and of those, 183 fully completed their passport by visiting 14 of the 14 stations. This year, Black River Memorial Hospital (BRMH) is hoping to have increased attendance as it has implemented new stations. This event wouldn’t be possible without the support of community partners, including Jackson County Department of Health and Human Services, Krohn Clinic, Ho-Chunk Nation Behavioral Health Division, and other community members.
As BRMH continually evaluates and implements new security measures, work has begun on the after-hours access control for the 3rd and lower floors. Budgeted for 2024 and timed to coincide with the eICU implementation, card readers (swipes) were installed in all the elevators and select doors to secure the third and lower floors to align with the hospital access and visitation policy hours. More information will be shared in the next two weeks, along with additional details about access.
Established in 2023, the Mental Wellness Walk-A-Thon tackles the mental health portion of the community health needs assessment and the hospital’s community health improvement plan to connect with community partners. This Walk-A-Thon features different mental wellness walking “stations” where community members can stop by and learn about various aspects of wellness, including suicide and self-harm, balancing emotions, music and sound therapy, nutrition, breathing, artistic expressions, physical activities such as yoga, kickboxing and Zumba, interactive animal stations, and local resources for phone assistance and county support.
These stations, along with the walk itself, are free to attend. While attendance at each station is encouraged through the use of “passports” participants can use to mark off each station they visit, the casual nature of the walking route ensures that participants can select which stations suit their needs or interests best and visit accordingly.
While the Walk-A-Thon debuted in 2023, over 200 people attended, and of those, 183 fully completed their passport by visiting 14 of the 14 stations. This year, Black River Memorial Hospital (BRMH) is hoping to have increased attendance as it has implemented new stations. This event wouldn’t be possible without the support of community partners, including Jackson County Department of Health and Human Services, Krohn Clinic, Ho-Chunk Nation Behavioral Health Division, and other community members.
As BRMH continually evaluates and implements new security measures, work has begun on the after-hours access control for the 3rd and lower floors. Budgeted for 2024 and timed to coincide with the eICU implementation, card readers (swipes) were installed in all the elevators and select doors to secure the third and lower floors to align with the hospital access and visitation policy hours. More information will be shared in the next two weeks, along with additional details about access.
