VOZ Latina's public affairs manager calls Lilian a "godsend" because each week she comes prepared to talk about healthcare issues important to people in the area.
Lilian Newey, RN, accidentally applied for a job she thought was in Salt Lake City only to find out it was really in Idaho, at Cassia Regional Hospital. The Cassia team talked her into taking the job anyway, so she moved nearly 200 miles to Burley, Idaho, where hundreds of people are now benefiting from her unplanned career move—especially on Tuesday nights.
That’s because in addition to being a primary care manager at a clinic at Cassia Regional, Lilian hosts her own Spanish radio show, “Our Community,” on VOZ Latina 91.9 every Tuesday night. The two-hour program focuses on healthcare issues that impact the many Spanish-speaking people who live and work in and around Cassia County, Idaho.
Lilian was born in Guatemala and moved to Utah when she was nine. She says the reason she went into healthcare is because she wanted to help the Hispanic community.
“I totally can relate to not being able to understand what’s being said around me and not being able to communicate,” she says. “I have a passion because I want other people to be able to be spoken to in their own native language and to be able to understand, especially when it comes to medical information they need to know.”
She says she thought she was applying for a job at a Salt Lake clinic but after her interview they said, “Would you be willing to come out and take a look at Idaho anyway?”
She talked her family into the move and now says she loves her new home. It didn’t take long for her to notice a need in the community.
“One of the things I realized early on when I moved out here is we have a lot of illiteracy in the Hispanic community because a lot of people work as farmhands and in dairies,” Lilian says. “Some of them can’t even read or write in Spanish, so doing things like running a story in a local newspaper doesn’t seem to get the information out to them.”
Lilian was asked to do the radio program after she was invited to go on air as a guest to talk about COVID-19 vaccinations.
Lilian says at one point she traveled to dairies to offer people a chance to get vaccinated. She says 60 of the 75 people she worked with couldn’t read or write, so she had to help them with the paperwork.
The need to get accurate information to the Hispanic community became more urgent when COVID-19 broke out. Community leaders went to the hospital for help as they tried to get accurate information out to the people. Lilian, Cassia administrator Ben Smalley, and other caregivers went on the radio to get the message out. Lilian was invited back to answer more questions.
“I went on the radio at various times talking about COVID, explaining to people where they could get tested, explaining the symptoms of COVID, and debunking some of the wrong information that was out there,” she says. “A lot of people were getting some of their news from the media in Mexico. And if you remember, at the beginning of the pandemic, Mexico didn’t shut down. And they were like, ‘Oh, we’re not going to wear masks. We’re not going to do this.’”
Lilian was eventually invited to start her own show every Tuesday night. They asked the right person. Lilian isn’t only a certified interpreter with Intermountain, but she’d also had some experience in radio because she’d served an internship at FM 100 in Salt Lake City when she was in college.
Damian Rodriguez is a DJ and the station’s public affairs manager for the ten-year-old non-profit station that reaches people in the Cassia and Minidoka counties. He says that when Lilian comes in to do her show, she’s prepared.
“She’s a godsend to the radio station,” he says. “She brings positive and important information about medicine, diabetes, COVID, and other things to her listeners. She’s very articulate in English and in Spanish.”
Lilian says one day a man came in to her clinic to be vaccinated for COVID-19 but wasn’t sure which vaccine to get. He called his daughter, talked to her, and came back and told Lilian, “My daughter has been listening to this lady on the radio…” and then said he planned to follow the lady’s advice—not realizing his daughter had been listening to Lilian.
She didn’t tell him about her radio program. Lilian who isn’t paid to do her radio show says her reward is hearing that people are listening and acting on her advice.
“It’s just community service for me,” she says. “It’s a way for me to really put my foot out there and really promote the hospital. I always give my hospital phone number so they can call me if they have any questions.”
Ben Smalley says about 33% of the people in area they serve are Hispanic and reaching them is key to improving the health of the community.
“Lilian has gone above and beyond by spending countless hours attending Hispanic events, talking on the radio, and responding to patient questions,” he says. “When we held mass vaccine events, any time we had extra doses that would be wasted, Lilian’s fingers would blur over her phone keyboard and people would magically show up for their vaccine. Lilian has a true passion for the Hispanic community. Her friendly, personable approach has helped countless patients who are nervous, confused, or hesitant about their healthcare. She provides priceless support and guidance to help them and their families receive the care they need.”