Franklin's VA Clinic:

The Franklin VA Clinic is located at 603 Haifleigh St. in Franklin, under the United States and POW/MIA flags, and has been for 10 years.
Last month marked the 10-year anniversary for the small, unassuming clinic, and many in St. Mary Parish still don’t even know it is there.
Joyce Small, medical assistant at the clinic, has worked there for the 10 years it has been in operation.
“The best thing about working here is visiting with the veterans," she said. “They all have a story to tell, especially when we get in the lab. Now, they are very quiet when they are in the waiting room, but when they get to the lab, we openly talk with each other.”
When asked what the most challenging thing about working at the clinic for the last 10 years has been, Small said it was bringing in vets who had missed their appointments, rescheduling, and explaining the importance of making regularly scheduled appointments. She attributed the bulk of its challenge to the amount of paperwork involved.
Small also said that in her tenure working for the clinic, she has seen three clinic administrators at the helm, and of those three, she proclaimed the current Clinic Operational Director/Clinic Chief Chandra Johnson as “the best.”
Johnson has been the clinic director for four of the clinic’s 10 years, but said of her four years, “Before I got here, the clinic was invisible. Now, the clinic is more visible and offers more services between us, the community, and the main campuses of the VA.”
She said she thinks the word is spreading throughout the local veteran community that the clinic is available, and she said she has also seen an uptick in the rate of returning veterans.
Being a veteran herself, Johnson utilizes that knowledge, and those skills and experiences to educate fellow veterans in a language they understand and are comfortable with.
She said she combats the pervasive stigma among veterans about the VA by making available to them options and services that not only fly in the face of the stigma of inundated and flimsy service, but exhibit the flat-out antithesis.
“When they come in,” Johnson said, “they are blind. So, we start sharing information from the front desk to when they are seen by their provider, we can answer their questions, and let them know about other services available, so they can utilize those benefits they never used, or even knew they had. Then, we connect them with other community services which are VA representatives, for other aspects of their care.”
As for the clinic’s view to its future, Johnson said, “We want to get more veterans in. I want to grow the clinic, as that is always our top goal. But also, to continue to remember that the main reason we are here every day is to care for those veterans and give them the services they really deserve and need; and/or to put them in contact with the services we can’t provide here.”
She also stated that it is important that veterans throughout St. Mary Parish become aware of the clinic’s readiness to serve them moving forward, and in Iberia Parish, as well.
She observed of the clinic’s current patients, “I find they are very excited about being here. So, that makes it very rewarding to come here every day, because they are so thankful and grateful. For so long they didn’t have a clinic, and now every day is like a new beginning for them. And that goes millions of miles for us.”
Tammy Threatts, licensed clinical social worker at Franklin VA Clinic is the other of the clinic’s staff to have been there for 10 years.
“Since the beginning, the population of the clinic has increased,” Threatts said, “We have grown, and we are getting more patients now from the younger veteran population. People are still hearing about us and are coming in. So, now we have more of a variety than in the past, as far as age groups are concerned.”
She said that the Franklin clinic “has been great for the community, because prior to this they (veterans) had to drive either all the way to New Orleans, or to Houma. So, they didn’t have a lot of options as far as coming to a clinic that is closer.
“Any time you are dealing with a rural community, you need to have more services available to them so that it will be more convenient, and they will be more likely to utilize those services.”
Threatts also reported having been told that the Franklin clinic is preferable to other, larger locations because at the Franklin clinic, the patients receive more intimate and personal care.
“I think that when you come here, you get a staff that is more understanding and more empathetic. You don’t get staff that is dismissive or focused on not wanting to be here. We are always going to put our veterans first,” Threatts said.
Johnson confided that she is working with the city and other local entities to put together a social gathering whereby the clinic will officially celebrate its 10th birthday. But details on that are still in the works.
However, the clinic will be open on Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., except for holidays, as always, and will continue to provide optimal care for the local community’s veterans.