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Essentia Health's Paul Sweere named as MHA's Community Health Worker of the Year

Sweere, a Perham native, began working at the Essentia Health St. Mary's clinic in Detroit Lakes about four and a half years ago.

Paul Sweere with award.JPG
Paul Sweere, a community health worker at Essentia Health St. Mary's in Detroit Lakes for the last four and a half years, displays the award he was presented with recently as the Minnesota Hospital Association's Community Health Worker of the Year.
Vicki Gerdes / Detroit Lakes Tribune

DETROIT LAKES — When Paul Sweere first saw the email in his work inbox at Essentia Health St. Mary's in Detroit Lakes, he thought it might be spam.

After all, he had no idea that he had even been nominated for the Minnesota Hospital Association's Community Health Worker of the Year award.

But not long after Sweere had forwarded the message to his department supervisor, Emily Kuenstler, for verification, she came to his office to let him know that she had nominated him for the honor herself.

"It was humbling," he said of the experience of accepting the award during MHA's annual conference in Minneapolis earlier this year.

Some of his colleagues' comments from the nomination stated: "Paul’s ability to meet patients where they are — both physically and emotionally — has helped them navigate complex healthcare and social service systems with dignity and success.

"He maintains weekly engagement with nearly 100% of the patients enrolled in his program and has achieved a 91% graduation rate — outcomes that far exceed typical engagement levels. Every patient we’ve surveyed who has worked with Paul has given him a 10/10 likelihood to recommend the program."

Sweere at MHA conference.jpg
Paul Sweere, second from left, accepted his Community Health Worker of the Year award from the Minnesota Hospital Association at their annual conference earlier this year. He was accompanied by several of his colleagues at the Essentia Health St. Mary's clinic in Detroit Lakes, including (from left) Jessica Schwartz, Dr. Shiela Klemmetsen, Kelly Black and Emily Kuenstler
Contributed / Essentia Health St. Mary's

Sweere, who was born and raised in Perham, earned a degree in sociology from North Dakota State University in Fargo after graduating from Perham High School.

Since graduating college, much of his career has been spent in the area of human services and social work, including a stint at Blue Sky, working with clients who faced various cognitive and physical challenges.

He and his wife Penny moved back to the Perham-Frazee area in 2006, after 15 years of living and working in the Twin Cities. They found a home east of Frazee, and north of Perham, where they have lived since.

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"We wanted to raise our family in the area we grew up in and were familiar with," he said.

That family now includes five children — Emily, Abigail, Henry, Lydia and Lucy — with the two youngest still living at home and attending high school, and the other three now working on growing families of their own.

"No grandchildren yet," he said, adding, "that's coming at some point."

Sweere says he had been working in the human resources field when he saw the advertisement for a community health worker position opening up in Detroit Lakes and decided to apply.

"I wanted to get back into working directly with people," he said, adding that he started at Essentia about four and a half years ago.

"I enjoy listening to people," Sweere said. It's a big part of his job at Essentia.

"Community health workers are mainly front-line workers, mostly in the clinic setting, but occasionally we’re called in to the emergency room or urgent care," he said. "What we attempt to do is to work with our providers on identifying what the needs of our patients are outside of the clinic setting."

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Paul Sweere MHA conference.jpg
Paul Sweere says that accepting his Community Health Worker of the Year award from the Minnesota Hospital Association earlier this year was "a humbling experience."
Contributed / Essentia Health St. Mary's

In other words, he added, a CHW helps to identify the specific financial and social stressors that may impact the patient's health, such as financial or food insecurity, housing and transportation issues, lack of adequate insurance coverage, homelessness or unemployment (health-related or otherwise).
"The medical team is concerned about patients' physical health," Sweere says. "But oftentimes, social situations can have an impact on their physical health."

For instance, food insecurity can affect the patient's diet, either from not having enough food, or not having access to healthier food options; lack of adequate insurance coverage may cause them to have to choose between eating or paying rent, and paying for necessary medications; homelessness can lead to a wide variety of negative health impacts.

If they need assistance in filling out an application for insurance, or for housing, food or heating assistance, the CSW is there to lend a hand as needed. "We work with our patients to facilitate accessing all the resources they can tap into and utilize," he said.

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The Community Health Worker of the Year award was presented to Paul Sweere earlier this year. He has been employed as a CHW at the Essentia Health St. Mary's clinic in Detroit Lakes for about four and a half years.
Contributed / Essentia Health St. Mary's

Though most of his appointments are at the clinic, after a patient has seen their medical provider, Sweere said, he'll occasionally meet patients at a public location outside the clinic setting, or even at their home, though the latter is not a common occurrence.

As such, he added, part of his work also involves developing good relationships with nonprofit organizations like the Becker County Food Pantry and Mahube-Otwa Community Action, United Way of Becker County and any local churches or ministries that offer the resources his patients might need to get back on their feet.

Sweere was the only person at Essentia's Detroit Lakes clinic to be honored by MHA this year, though Essentia as a whole did receive several other awards during the conference, including:

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  • Communications-Workforce Award: Essentia's Talent Acquisition and Recruitment Marketing teams.
  • Hiring and Recruiting Award: Essentia's Talent Acquisition Team.
  • Pipelines and Partnerships Award: Essentia's Workforce Strategy Team.
  • MHA Committee Legacy Award: Essentia Health Vice President of Quality Dan Collins.
A reporter at Detroit Lakes Newspapers since relocating to the community in October 2000, Vicki was promoted to Community News Lead for the Detroit Lakes Tribune and Perham Focus on Jan. 1, 2022. She has covered pretty much every "beat" that a reporter can be assigned, from county board and city council to entertainment, crime and even sports. Born and raised in Madelia, Minnesota, she is a graduate of Hamline University, from which she earned a bachelor's degree in English literature (writing concentration). You can reach her at 218-844-1454 or vgerdes@dlnewspapers.com.
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