OC Vaccine Clinic Makes an Impact

Approximately 50 people received a vaccine at Olivet College Health and Wellness Center’s vaccine clinic in the Mott academic building.

“We have a vaccine clinic that we do annually with CVS,” Robin LuckadooChadderdon, director of Counseling, Health and Wellness said. “We partner with them corporately, but Jeff [Wildern] is really helpful to making all that happen.”

Jeff Wildern, a pharmacist at CVS who is also on the Board of Trustees at the college, has been doing the vaccine clinic for over 10 years.

“We [had] the COVID and the flu [vaccine]. The new booster,” he said. Jen Deleeuw also worked with Wildern, primarily helping students with insurance paperwork and assisting with giving vaccinations.

“I would say most people get both vaccines at the same time. This year at least it seems to be that way,” she said.

Although the vaccine clinic only lasted for one day, the Health and Wellness Center can still provide resources to students who need them.

“CVS has an app that we can help students advocate to get scheduled and registered for different vaccines through their clinics. They also have walk-in options, and Meijer is the same,” said Chadderdon.

In order to get vaccines or other health services, students do need insurance they can be billed through.

“If we have students that don’t have insurance, then Jaime [Chemacki] tries to help them navigate the [MIBridges] site for DHS to try to be able to get insurance, or through the ACA registries to try to help students get insurance,” said Chadderdon.

Chemacki sits down with the students who have problems with their insurance. “Rarely are students in a place to pay for their own health insurance and they get dropped from their parents’ for various reasons,” she said via email. “We sit down and set up a MIBridges account and complete the application process in about 15-20 minutes and then it takes MDHHS about two weeks to respond and I help them decipher the correspondence they receive.”

The Health and Wellness Center is located in Room 212 of the Mott Academic building, and is open Monday-Friday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. While there is no medical staff on site, they offer support for mental health, physical health, and other wellness services.