Quan Ly, MD, vice chair for DEI in the UNMC Department of Surgery and the associate director of DEI for the Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center, and Robert Taylor, MD, assistant professor in the UNMC Department of Surgery, as well as Bellevue Medical Center, will be three of the 2023 recipients of the Milagro Award from OneWorld Community Health Centers.
The award recognizes work to provide health care to OneWorld patients, many of whom belong to minority and underserved populations.
“Dr. Quan Ly, Dr. Robert Taylor and the Bellevue Medical Center exemplify our event’s theme of connection,” said Andrea Skolkin, CEO of OneWorld. “All three have worked together to provide OneWorld patients with the colonoscopies they need for their medical care. Together they have helped OneWorld patients find a number of pre-cancerous growths and thus saved lives. We are very grateful for the services they provide to our patients.”
The award will be presented at the Milagro Award Banquet on Thursday (Nov. 9).
Dr. Ly said shortly after assuming her DEI role in the department, she reached out to OneWorld, a federally qualified health center, to ask about their needs. She was told that many patients with positive FIT tests (fecal immunochemical tests) were not following up with colonoscopies.
She reached out to Bellevue Medical Center and Dr. Taylor for help.
“We streamlined the workflow to get patients from OneWorld to Bellevue Medical Center for colonoscopies,” she said. “We worked out interpretation issues. We worked to make things go smoothly and increase the volume of patients getting procedures.”
The effort is paying off. In 2021, six patients from OneWorld received colonoscopies at Bellevue Medical Center. In 2022, that number increased to 22. In 2023, access expanded to the main Nebraska Medical Center campus. So far in 2023, 82 colonoscopies have been completed, 36 by Dr. Taylor.
Dr. Ly is quick to credit Dr. Taylor and Kelly Vaughn, vice president of operations at Bellevue Medical Center.
“Dr. Taylor did the colonoscopies,” she said. “I just helped facilitate the partnership.”
Dr. Taylor called the Milagro Award an honor.
“But really, I’m just doing my job,” he said. “As physicians/surgeons, we are given the privilege to work with people, and I have taken the philosophy that we all pretty much fall in that category regardless of background or socioeconomics. It is how I’ve always practiced. Jesus’s second commandment … ‘Love thy neighbor as you love yourself.’”
Kelly Vaughn, vice president of operations at the Bellevue Medical Center, credited many staff and physicians for helping the effort succeed.
“Determining the best workflow to support our One World colonoscopy patients coming to Bellevue Medical Center has been the work of a large group of staff and physicians,” Vaughn said. “This group, in partnership with staff at OneWorld, has led to quality patient care and a great patient experience.”
The effort is saving lives, Dr. Ly said.
“Colon cancer is quite preventable,” she said. “If the cancer is picked up early and confined to the colon, there is over a 90% survival rate.”
With the new screening age set at 45 – though those with strong family history of cancer may need to start earlier — there is great potential to save lives, she said.
Dr. Ly said the award humbled her, as well, and echoed Skolkin’s thoughts on the theme of connection.
“We were all in this project together – OneWorld, Bellevue Medical Center, Dr. Taylor and myself – and it is satisfying and rewarding to know that we can make a difference.”