Blue Ridge Health and Safelight: A Partnership Built Around Survivors
No single organization, program, or type of expertise can solve some of the most difficult healthcare challenges in Western North Carolina.
For survivors of domestic violence, strangulation, and sexual assault, that reality is particularly clear. Survivors need compassionate, timely medical care. They may need proper forensic evidence collection. They need to feel safe. They may also need advocacy, mental health services, legal resources, and other support during and long after a forensic medical examination.
In Henderson County, Blue Ridge Health and Safelight are bringing those pieces together through a partnership that also involves local law enforcement and two area hospitals. Together, they have created a more coordinated approach that connects survivors with specialized medical care, advocacy, and other essential services.
Safelight supports survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, child abuse, elder abuse, and human trafficking. Since the community-based forensic examination program officially opened in 2025, it has helped 55 survivors access specially trained medical professionals and advocates who understand the importance of trauma-informed care.
Blue Ridge Health provides the medical professionals and clinical expertise that help make the program possible. Its clinicians conduct forensic medical examinations at Safelight and, when a patient’s medical condition prevents travel to Safelight, at UNC Health Pardee and AdventHealth Hendersonville.
Safelight spent nearly three years developing the program and established the first community-based, coordinated forensic examination site of its kind in North Carolina, with 24-hour access for adults and children.
Its welcoming environment offers an alternative to a hospital emergency department, where long waits and unfamiliar surroundings can add to an already traumatic experience. Through its 24-hour crisis hotline, Safelight coordinates access to forensic examinations and connects survivors with advocacy, trauma-focused therapy, case management, emergency shelter, and other support services. Its Child Advocacy Center also provides specialized services for children.
“Safelight is such an amazing organization with advocacy and the family justice center for victims and their families. BRH has the medical expertise and the same passion to serve those who are underserved and have experienced trauma,” said Tammy Greenwell, Chief Executive Officer of Blue Ridge Health.
“Working together, we can combine our resources to create a program that serves the community to the greatest extent possible during a time when victims have often been turned away or sent to multiple locations to receive services. It becomes a one-stop shop to take care of people during their most vulnerable moments.”
For Safelight CEO Lauren Wilkie, the partnership represents the culmination of nearly three years of work to establish a community-based forensic examination program in Henderson County.
The need for that program became clear almost immediately. Just one week after opening, Safelight received a call about a woman who had been sexually assaulted and was told she would have to wait until the following day or travel to Charlotte for a forensic examination. After her friend contacted UNC Health Pardee, the hospital connected them with Safelight’s 24-hour crisis hotline.
Within an hour, Safelight had responded, providing advocacy and access to a forensic medical examination.
“We are extremely grateful to Blue Ridge Health for saying yes to this partnership with us,” Wilkie said.
The partnership reflects something larger about Blue Ridge Health’s role in Western North Carolina. Improving health does not always mean creating another BRH program or asking patients to walk through a BRH door. Sometimes it means recognizing the expertise already in the community, bringing BRH’s strengths to the table and building something together that neither organization could create alone.
What’s taking shape at Safelight is drawing attention beyond Henderson County. As one participant in the initiative put it, when talking with others across North Carolina who do this work, “what Safelight is trying to build here is their dream.”
It is a powerful example of what partnership can make possible: care designed around the survivor, expertise brought together in one place, and a better-equipped community to respond when someone needs it most.