{"id":183319,"date":"2022-03-24T11:11:22","date_gmt":"2022-03-24T15:11:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=183319"},"modified":"2024-03-05T08:39:03","modified_gmt":"2024-03-05T13:39:03","slug":"homeless-no-more-thanks-to-guardian-angel-from-uconn-health","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2022\/03\/homeless-no-more-thanks-to-guardian-angel-from-uconn-health\/","title":{"rendered":"Homeless No More, Thanks to \u2018Guardian Angel\u2019 From UConn Health"},"content":{"rendered":"

This winter was a new experience for Tim Guilmette.<\/p>\n

He spent it in his new apartment in Enfield \u2014 a significant milestone for a man who\u2019s spent most of his adult life homeless.<\/p>\n

\"Jasmine
Jasmine Ortiz-Rivas is a community health specialist for population health at UConn Health. (Tina Encarnacion\/UConn Health photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThis was his first holiday season spent in a home where he was able to decorate and celebrate,\u201d says Jasmine Ortiz-Rivas, whom Guilmette credits with getting him out of the woods and under a roof.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would not be anywhere without that woman,\u201d he says. \u201cShe is my guardian angel. I don\u2019t think I would have lasted another winter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Guilmette, 64, describes himself as a \u201csurvivalist since I was 6 years old.\u201d He got used to fending for himself outdoors at an early age, during a troubled childhood growing up in East Hartland.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was a kid, I ran away from home all the time because my father was so abusive,\u201d he says. \u201cI used to spend some of my winter vacations from school out in the woods because I couldn\u2019t stand being around my father.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Cold never bothered me until probably the last couple of years, when my breathing started going bad. — Tim Guilmette<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

He spent most of the last four decades \u201ceither living in the woods or living in the streets,\u201d Guilmette says, openly admitting he contributed to his living and health challenges by making poor choices with smoking, drugs, and alcohol.<\/p>\n

It was 2018 and the deterioration of his health was accelerating. His legs became extraordinarily swollen, and his breathing became laborious.<\/p>\n

\u201cI used to be able to deal with the cold, no problem, I used to walk around with a t-shirt in the winter,\u201d Guillmette says. \u201cCold never bothered me until probably the last couple of years, when my breathing started going bad.\u201d<\/p>\n

At this point, his home was a makeshift campsite about two miles into the woods in North Granby.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt used to take me 25 to 30 minutes to walk to the campsite, now it would take me close to two and a half hours. I had to do something. It was either get out or die. It was one of the two.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Merideth
Meredith Bertrand is a nurse practitioner at UConn Health’s primary care practice in Simsbury. (Photo by Tina Encarnacion)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It was 2019 when he was diagnosed with congestive heart failure. He was in the hospital with an exacerbation related to that, and soon after that he became a patient of UConn Health nurse practitioner Meredith Bertrand<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was homeless and had not had any health care in several years,\u201d Bertrand recalls from her first encounter with Guilmette. \u201cHe was suffering with various medical problems including COPD, heart failure, various arthritic problems, suspected sleep apnea, recurrent cellulitis infections. He was doing OK on the day I first met him, but this was right after having had spent a week in the hospital getting stabilized and \u2018fixed up.\u2019 It was clear that he was going to require a lot of care in order to maintain this state.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything that I\u2019ve got right now should have been diagnosed 10 years ago,\u201d Guilmette says. \u201cBut I wasn\u2019t going to the doctor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Guillmette says at points over the two years that followed he was retaining 100 pounds of fluid in his legs and had a 17% carbon monoxide level in his blood.<\/p>\n

\u201cDr. [Raymond] Foley<\/a> told me, \u2018I just can\u2019t believe you\u2019re walking and talking,\u2019\u201d Guilmette says. \u201cHe was like, \u2018My God, to be honest with you, you should be dead.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

By now, the \u201cguardian angel\u201d had appeared, in the person of Ortiz-Rivas.<\/p>\n

\n

He was a little harsh when we first spoke, he felt like people lied to him all the time. — Jasmine Ortiz-Rivas<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Bertrand had referred Guilmette to UConn Health\u2019s population health team, where Ortiz-Rivas is a community health specialist, to see about finding him housing.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a little harsh when we first spoke, he felt like people lied to him all the time,\u201d Ortiz-Rivas. \u201cI felt like it was a challenge. I told him, \u2018I\u2019m a different type of person, and if I can help, I\u2019m going to do whatever I can to help you.\u2019 That\u2019s how we built a relationship. I had to earn it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The population health team\u2019s charge is to work with patients to remove barriers to care, improve patient experience, and reduce health care costs. The community health specialists connect patients with resources such as transportation, food, and other basic needs.<\/p>\n

Guilmette says before UConn Health\u2019s population health team got involved, all he knew were empty promises and disappointment.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve had, I guarantee you, three dozen people that were supposed to contact me, and I never heard from any of them,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd when Jasmine called me, I told her, \u2018I want to thank you very much.\u2019 She said, \u2018for what?\u2019 And I said, \u2018just because you called me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

But he made it clear he was not interested in getting his hopes up if she wasn\u2019t going to follow through with him.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen she got done hearing my story, she said there was no way she was going to stop,\u201d Guillmette says.<\/p>\n

Many calls would follow, including some where it was just him venting about what was frustrating him that day.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was really looking for someone to just be there for him, and it was tough in the beginning to win over his trust,\u201d Ortiz-Rivas says.<\/p>\n

\n

I said, \u2018Look, Tim, if you do not take care of your health, there\u2019s not going to be a home that I can find for you to move into, because you may not even make it to move into a home. — Jasmine Ortiz-Rivas<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

By early 2021, the fluid buildup in his legs was really slowing him down, making the two-mile walk to the campsite nearly impossible.<\/p>\n

The breakthrough came when Bertrand was having trouble convincing him he really needed to be seen in the emergency department for the swelling of his legs and his oxygen level. He refused, for fear of losing his few possessions at his campsite in the woods.<\/p>\n

\u201cI gave him a call and we had a little heart-to-heart \u2014 by then I think we\u2019d established a relationship where I could speak freely to him,\u201d Ortiz-Rivas says. \u201cI said, \u2018Look, Tim, if you do not take care of your health, there\u2019s not going to be a home that I can find for you to move into, because you may not even make it to move into a home. If you pass away, what\u2019s going to happen to your things, who\u2019s going to go get that stuff? That\u2019s minor. You need to focus on what\u2019s happening now, and you need to take care of your health.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

He relented.<\/p>\n

He got his friend Pete to drive him to the hospital, and he called Ortiz-Rivas from the ED to report he was there.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo matter what I\u2019m doing, the fluid was building back up,\u201d Guilmette says. \u201cAnd I do my medications religiously every day. So when I went into the hospital they said, \u2018OK, we\u2019re going to have to put you in rehab.\u2019 So I agreed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rehabilitation and physical therapy at the private skilled nursing facility did not go well for Guilmette, and his stay was short-lived. By April he was on his way back to living in the woods.<\/p>\n

Ortiz-Rivas says as miserable as his stay in rehab made him, it likely saved his life.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile he was in rehab, a tree fell on his tent, where he slept,\u201d she says. \u201cWho knows what could have happened?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

She found everybody. Put it that way. — Tim Guilmette<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Instead of going back to living in the woods, Guilmette stayed with Pete in North Granby, and the focus shifted to finding housing. Ortiz-Rivas and Guilmette\u2019s sister, Donna Buxton, were coordinating with Community Heath Resources (CHR), a nonprofit behavioral health care provider whose offerings include a housing services program.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat lady pushed for everything,\u201d Guilmette says. \u201cIf it wasn\u2019t for Jasmine pushing for everything like she did, I would have never gotten to that point where CHR could help me. She pushed the whole thing, so I was able to get in touch with them. She found everybody. Put it that way.\u201d<\/p>\n

The connection with CHR is what got him into his apartment in Enfield, where he\u2019s lived since last May.<\/p>\n

\"Jasmine
Jasmine Ortis-Rivas visits with Tim Guilmette during a recent appointment at UConn Health, 10 months after he moved into the apartment she helped him find. (Photo by Tina Encarnacion)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI feel like someone was guiding me, because it\u2019s a rare thing,\u201d Ortiz-Rivas says. \u201cHousing is a hard thing to find, especially in the Hartford area \u2014 anywhere in Connecticut, especially during COVID. It was so hard. It was challenging. With my team, I bounce my ideas off everyone I work with and I try to find different things. We work as a close team because we\u2019re here for the patients. I work with a team of people that actually care what happens to the patients once they leave UConn, and I think this team has made a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

The team includes nurses and community health specialists, under the leadership of Khadija Poitras-Rhea, associate vice president for population health.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis team has truly changed the way we provide care at UConn Health,\u201d Poitras-Rhea says. \u201cPatients will never achieve optimal health outcomes if we don\u2019t address the barriers to accessing care. By connecting patients to critical resources like food, housing and transportation we create meaningful change in their lives so that they can focus on attending medical appointments and following their treatment plans. Patients are often surprised that we offer these types of services but they are so appreciative of the support. Our providers have been extremely supportive of our programs. They often hear firsthand the challenges that patients face and they love that they can refer patients to population health for assistance.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for Guilmette, and what motivated him to make his health a greater priority?<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to die yet,\u201d Guilmette says. \u201cI\u2019ve got two great nephews, a great niece, and I want to see them grow up. I want to show them how to go fishing, play catch with them, do stuff that I want to do with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

And as for Ortiz-Rivas being his \u201cguardian angel\u201d?<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought I was just doing my job,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd when he said that to me, I choked up. He choked up. And it showed, wow, that it did mean a lot. I can see a difference, which is rewarding in itself. Just to see that and be a part of it is a big deal. It was perfect timing for me to meet him and to work with him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI don\u2019t think I would have lasted another winter.\u201d A man who was homeless for most of the last four decades credits the population health team at UConn Health for helping him find a home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":111,"featured_media":183318,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1715,2193,2231,2235,179],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2010],"class_list":["post-183319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community-impact","category-hartford-county","category-health-well-being","category-today-homepage","category-uconn-health"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-29 19:25:27","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/111"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=183319"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183319\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":210508,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183319\/revisions\/210508"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/183318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=183319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=183319"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=183319"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=183319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}