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Program Design & Management | News | SOS Van Routes | SOS Resources | VET SOS

SOS Program Highlights

• Provided over 900 homeless people with 1,738 service visits to help improve their lives and move them off the streets (exceeded HCH contract expectations).
  • 759 Medical visits
    • 353 Physician visits
    • 406 Nurse Practitioner visits
  • 687 Case management visits
  • 266 Health education visits
  • 26 Nursing visits
• Hosted 24 UCSF primary care medical residents for 3-6 week rotations.
• Hosted 4 MSN & RN students from USF & SFSU for semester-long rotations. 
• Hosted 18 1st-year medical students and 10 Community HealthCorps members for site visits focused on introduction to homeless health issues.
• Strengthened partnerships with SFCCC clinics including Haight Ashbury Free Clinics, Inc. and Lyon-Martin Health Services, to provide additional medical coverage at SOS clinic sites.  
• Received $50,000 from an anonymous donor to support improved access to dental care for SOS patients. Received additional institutional gifts from: Louis R. Lurie Foundation- $26,500; Amgen Foundation- $15,000; Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund- $10,000; Evelyn & Walter Haas, Jr. Fund- $4,500; and The Nick Traina Foundation- $1,000.
• Selected as one of seven sites to participate in a Kaiser-funded study aiming to improve rates of intimate partner violence screening and treatment in community health settings.
• Received from “Warm Wishes” 200 backpacks stuffed with new, warm gloves, scarves, hats, wool socks, and rain ponchos to distribute to SOS clients this winter.
• Provided training and technical assistance to potential and established homeless medical programs; hosted a site visit from the Medical Director of a street medicine program in Copenhagen, Denmark.
• Expanded SOS policy & procedure manual; created key policies on: dental referrals, mental health crisis, primary care referrals, professional boundaries, and resident supervision.
• Revised SOS chart forms to better capture patient data.
• Administered seasonal flu shots and other immunizations to over 100 patients.
• Provided health information, referrals, and veterinary services (through VET SOS project) at all 5 Project Homeless Connect events.
• Supported VET SOS to provide volunteer-driven veterinary services to 905 companion animals of homeless San Franciscans and human health information and referrals to 269 of their human companions.
• Assisted VET SOS to obtain funding to grow and sustain key services. Received institutional giving from: The Thornton and Katrina Glide Foundation- $10,000; The Max and Victoria Dreyfus Foundation- $7,500; San Francisco Veterinary Medical Association - $3,000; and Petco Foundation - $1,500.

News

2010 SOS & VetSOS Volunteer Appreciation Party

Street Outreach Services (SOS)

Street Outreach Services (SOS) is the mobile outreach component of SFCCC’s Health Care for the Homeless (HCH) program. Since 1988, SOS has provided high quality, non-judgmental health services directly to homeless people in places where they live and congregate.

Traveling in a medical van to sites throughout San Francisco, the dedicated SOS team of doctors, nurses, outreach workers, and volunteers creates “clinics without walls,” at soup kitchens, on city streets, in parks, and if the need arises — and it has — under freeway overpasses. SOS also provides its services at San Francisco's Project Homeless Connect in the Civic Center. In other words, anywhere homeless San Franciscans can be found, the SOS team finds itself.

At these sites, the team provides critically needed preventive and urgent health care services; distributes hygiene and health supplies; helps people to complete applications for benefits; and refers clients to citywide clinics for more extensive care — assisting with transportation to be sure they get there. They also connect clients to an array of social services, and guide them to gain access to these programs. Additionally, SOS provides vitamins, condoms, clothes, as well as information regarding various resources, including drug detoxification and rehabilitation programs, housing, and medical and social services.

SOS provides services to low-income people who are experiencing extreme poverty and homelessness. Clients include veterans, immigrants, sex workers, and vehicularly housed individuals, as well as people suffering from mental illness and drug addiction disorders. SOS provides a variety of medical and social services free of charge. Many acute health problems are treated on site, while those patients requiring more extensive care are given appointments in community clinics or are referred to S.F. General Hospital.

Making “house calls” to people who have no home to call their own indicates just how far SFCCC, with its nine partner clinics, will go to fulfill its mission to ensure that all San Franciscans have access to health care.

Started in 1982, SFCCC provides programs and services that preserve and promote the longstanding tradition of community health care that began with our first partner. Each of them made vision a reality by starting neighborhood clinics — “medical homes” to serve those who had fallen through the cracks of the health care system. A safe, welcoming place where people are valued, respected and, most importantly, understood. SOS draws from that same tradition.

SOS utilizes every avenue to reach its homeless clients, many of whom have companion animals. In 2001, SOS began an innovative project called Veterinary Street Outreach Services (VET SOS). Based on an idea from a former SOS client, the SOS program partnered with a volunteer veterinarian to begin offering care to homeless animals, as a way to reach out to homeless San Franciscans. This pilot project has been very successful in getting our clients linked to health and other social services -- the first step to turning their lives around. Research confirms our findings of the importance of the human-animal bond, as a road to healing.

It is respect and understanding that is key to the success of SOS. By going directly to homeless people — meeting them on their own turf and terms, in their neighborhoods — the SOS team builds a relationship of trust, and breaks down the barriers that keep them from the care they so greatly need.

Street Outreach Services (SOS) is funded by a combination of federal and private sources, and is operated by SFCCC in collaboration with its partner clinics.

For SOS van routes, please click here. For SOS resources, please click here.

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