Since Rocky Top Student Health Services opened its doors to students Aug. 29, the health center hasn’t seen much use.
According to an email sent to York Hill residents Oct. 3, the health center at York Hill is open for students from noon to 7:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and is closed on weekends.
Although health services is technically open until 8 p.m., Director of Student Health Services Kathryn Macaione said the change in operational hours in her email was intentional. After the physician assistant leaves at 7 p.m., it is the nurse’s job to clean and restock the exam rooms, as well as let Macaione know about supply needs.
“I think we have to be very realistic about what we’re offering,” Macaione said. “Student health on [Mount Carmel] is open 24/7, and that’s so much more than any of your private colleges in Connecticut.”
Quinnipiac and the Department of Student Health Services chose the hours with students’ schedules in mind. These times are experimental, according to Macaione.
Yet these hours don’t work for many students.
“If they’re trying to improve [York Hill] and expand this, you can’t be like ‘Oh, you have to go down to the main campus,’” junior Joelle Paolino said. “It’s not something like food, where I can get something somewhere else. It’s medical needs. It’s important. My roommate has allergies. What if she has an allergic reaction? We’d be in trouble. Like ‘Oh, it’s not between 12 and 8. Sucks to be her.’”
Some students, like Katerina Johnson and roommate Chelsea Adamchak, aren’t at York Hill during those hours. Meetings and classes keep them busy off campus throughout the day. Adamchak, who has suffered from allergic reactions at night, has been unable to receive treatment at Rocky Top Student Health Services.
“Up at York, every time we’ve been there, we either couldn’t get in or couldn’t talk to anyone that worked there,” Adamchak said. “They only had an EMT who didn’t know where anything was. It was so confusing because he didn’t know what to do, so we obviously didn’t know what to do.”
Johnson said she doesn’t know what Adamchak would do if she wasn’t there. Adamchak doesn’t have a car and relies on Johnson for transportation to and from the Mount Carmel campus.
“It turned out [the EMT] wasn’t even authorized to give her anything, not even just over-the-counter Benadryl,” Johnson said. “He sent us down to the Mount Carmel Health Services. Why do we have a health services up there if they can’t even do anything for us? It wasn’t even that late. It was like 10:30 on a Friday night.”
While the EMT is on duty Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, Quinnipiac and Student Health Services prefer that a nurse administer treatment, which is why students are sent to Mount Carmel, according to Macaione. If a student doesn’t have a car or cannot drive themselves to the other campus, security will provide transportation.
