Hospice to leave office in Portland

State of the Heart Care will soon leave its Portland office.

Its services, however, will still be available to Jay County residents.

The hospice care agency announced in a press release last week that it would be closing its Portland office and moving to what executive director Kristi Strawser called a more “centralized” location in Winchester in September.

“Our patients and families will not feel any change,” Strawser said in a phone interview this week.

The agency no longer needed such a large office, she said, and its planned location at 743 E. Washington St., Winchester, is smaller and will allow the agency to operate more efficiently in the seven Indiana counties it provides services in.

Even before many Indiana workers began working from home during the coronavirus pandemic, Strawser said a lot of the agency’s staff worked remotely. Its nurses often travel directly from their homes to wherever they need to go to provide care and bypass the office setting entirely, she added.

The agency will still have Ohio offices in Coldwater and Greenville, Ohio, and operate an intake center in Greenville, Ohio.

Strawser said the agency has yet to find a buyer for its building located at 1237 W. Indiana 67, Portland, but that it has shown the building to interested buyers.

State of the Heart provides hospice care in addition to bereavement services and grief groups in every county it serves in addition to its annual Camp Encourage, which was held in a virtual format in July.

In total, the hospice agency provides service in Adams, Blackford, Delaware, Grant, Jay, Randolph and Wayne counties in Indiana and Allen, Auglaize, Darke, Mercer, Miami, Preble, Shelby and Van Wert counties in Ohio.