Healthcare comes via boat to Maine's most remote islanders

Twenty-two miles from the rocky coast of Maine sits 720-acre Matinicus Isle—the state’s most seaward island—with a year-round population of less than 100. Even when the weather is at its best, accessing healthcare services is a challenge for residents. 

That’s where Maine Seacoast Mission comes in. Headquartered on the mainland in Bar Harbor, the not-for-profit has provided islanders with healthcare services via boat for more than 100 years. Its fiscal 2018 $3.5 million budget is funded by an endowment, donations and grants.

Today, its 74-foot steel-hulled Sunbeam V is staffed with a registered nurse and equipped with state-of-the-art telemedicine technologies that allow islanders to have virtual visits with mainland doctors, mental health providers and substance abuse counselors year-round. The organization spent $800,000 on island services in fiscal 2018, which also included some educational and worship activities.

The Sunbeam serves Matinicus Isle and nine other islands not connected to the mainland by bridges. Ninety percent of the islands’ 2,700 residents use the Sunbeam’s healthcare services. While telemedicine appointments with mainland providers are billed to patients’ insurance, all of the Sunbeam’s staff services are free to islanders.

The Sunbeam and its crew of five take three-day trips out to the islands to provide healthcare services every two weeks, and while they have a schedule for when they’ll visit certain islands, a trip rarely goes as planned, said Sharon Daley, a registered nurse who works on the boat and is director of island health services. The schedule depends on the wind, weather, tides and the various schedules of providers. “There is really no typical,” she said.

Most of the healthcare services are provided onboard. But if an islander can’t get to the boat, Daley will lug her equipment to their home, and she often gets stopped on the way for a “truck” healthcare visit as a lobsterman drives by.

Providing telemedicine services is really just a small fraction of the care the Sunbeam offers islanders, Daley said. 

“I always call the Sunbeam the islands’ living room because people come aboard and have cookies and talk,” she said. The ship’s crew also often invites islanders on board for breakfasts and suppers. 

“To be a healthy, vibrant community and person there’s a lot of different things you need,” she said. “We care not only for the whole person, but the whole community.”