The Community Health Center of Central Wyoming saw more than 14,000 patients through almost 70,000 visits in 2005.

But Mark Norby, chief information officer for the health center, said the number of people the health center helps every year is actually much higher.

He said there are many programs the health center offers to the community that do not require an appointment with a doctor, which most people do not know about.

"There are so many people we try to support and services we provide, that the employees here don't even know what they all are," Norby said of the center that is celebrating National Health Center Week this week.

One of the programs Norby said the center is most proud of is its dental clinic. Besides seeing 3,000 patients in 2005, hygienists educated hundreds of young students about oral hygiene.

Jessica Cooper, a dental hygienist at the clinic, travels to Head Start preschools and elementary schools throughout central Wyoming twice a year where she shows children decayed teeth, cultured oral bacteria and the effects tobacco can have on the body.

Last school year, Cooper said she spent about seven days in the schools educating.

"We really hit the tobacco hard for third- and fourth-graders," Cooper said of the program she has been offering for about three years. "We show how it is affecting your body from head to toe. We try to get the 'gross-out' factor during our presentation."

In order to gross out some students, she shows gruesome pictures of athletes who have sustained mouth injuries during a game or practice. Cooper said she stresses the importance of wearing mouth guards as another portion of oral health care.

And John Noffsinger, a physician assistant at the health center, makes sure students know all about the benefits of wearing mouth guards when he gives sports physicals, another special program offered.

Every summer just before school starts, the health center has two days where the center's patients as well as any student who signs up can get a sports physical for only $15, which is then donated back to the school district. Sports physicals will be offered at 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. this Thursday.

Noffsinger said the health center is very committed to sports medicine and he spends many of his Friday nights during the fall at high school football games volunteering medical coverage in case any injuries occur. He also goes to Kelly Walsh High School every Tuesday afternoon to visit the teams and evaluate any injuries. Another physician from the center goes to Natrona County High School every week.

"We also volunteer our time at all the state tournaments," Noffsinger said. "Nobody recognizes us as the health care providers for these tournaments, but we are really the only ones there."

Besides collaborating with the schools, the health center has collaborated with nursing homes and acts as the primary care provider for 50 percent of the nursing home patients in the area, said Cindy Works, a physician at the center who specializes in geriatric care.

Works said her team sets aside a morning a week when it evaluates the care of two older patients. This interdisciplinary team, made up of physicians, an occupational therapist, a case manager, a pharmacist, a social worker and a dietician, spends more than an hour discussing ways to better the care the patient is receiving.

Works said they change medications, diets or courses of treatment and in some cases have made some valuable interventions.

"The elderly are so vulnerable and they just relinquish so much control when they enter the medical world," Works said. "We try to give them the tools to keep control. We do a lot of defending people's autonomy to the very last possible moment."

She said her team works a lot with families in helping them understand their loved ones' decisions to stay at home and not seek outside help.

Gloria Elio said the health center also helps senior citizens, because it offers a transportation service to help those who are unable to get to the health center.

She also said another important service the health center gives to the community is a translation service. She said their translator, who speaks Spanish, actually takes calls from other health care providers in the area to help translate for patients who cannot speak English.

"We're very diverse," Elio said. "Instead of just family practice, we are much more comprehensive."