GOLDEN STATE OUTREACH

In the picture, left to right, are Marie Swank (MSQLP Board member), Andrea Dowdall (our Social Worker), Kim King (our Office Manager), Dr. Lotte Marcus (one of our founders and Past President), and Tammi Robinson, of MSFocus magazine.

Recently, MSF conducted an outreach visit to the Multiple Sclerosis Quality of Life Project (MSQLP), a grassroots organization in Monterey, California, which serves the tri-county area of Monterey, San Benito, and Santa Cruz.MSQLP was launched by a group of individuals whose lives had been impacted by MS, either as a patient, a medical practitioner, or as a family member.

In 1999, Drs. Gerard Lehrer and Lotte Marcus, both of whom were working in private practice with MS patients, were dissatisfied with what they saw as discontinuous and fragmented caregiving. In 2000, they began an extensive professional needs assessment of 80 patients with MS and 25 caregivers in the tri-county area.

The results of the survey confirmed that pressing needs existed for coordinated, collaborative care; improved communication between clients, their physicians, their families and their caregivers; control of costs; and assistance in finding and applying for available services and benefits.

"MSQLP hopes to establish itself as a pilot program for MS in non-urban areas in the same way that Hospice piloted a new approach to cancer some forty years ago," explained MSQLP President, Lotte Marcus, Ph.D. "Our mission is to steadfastly improve quality of life, in spite of the presence of an ongoing, degenerative disease process."