10JUN2008

Healthcare Providers Addressing Health Access Issues

Springfield-Greene County Health Director has long been saying that the solution to the nation’s health-care problems may best be tackled one community at a time.

Today, he laid out a strategy for doing just that at the City Council’s weekly lunch meeting.

The Health Department has pulled together a consortium of health-care providers from the major hospitals, health clinics and mental-health providers to address the issue of providing more comprehensive health care to the uninsured and underinsured residents of Greene County.

He estimates that about 37,000 people in Greene County have no health insurance and another 74,000 are underinsured, which he defines as having to pay more than 10 percent out of pocket for health care.

The group studying this issue includes among its goals: improving service delivery; offering appropriate access to health care; improving coverage and reimbursement; improving coordination of services for the un- and underinsured; and involving the community while doing so.

The Health Department’s Carmen Bradshaw is coordinating this effort, which is in the second phase of a strategy that started with identifying the potential partners and is now into community information gathering and framing possible intervention strategies.

She cited a model that Kansas City is using, which may or may not be appropriate for Greene County, but illustrates the idea that other communities are tackling this huge national issue on a very local basis.

One goal would be to develop a better cooperative, computerized system so that the various agencies that may serve one individual or family can better share information to reduce the expensive, episodic care that individuals without adequate insurance are forced to piece together, such as visits to the emergency room replacing primary care visits.

They believe that better case management would lead to a healthier community and would reduce the overall costs of health care for the un- and underinsured for patients and providers.

The PowerPoint presentation used today (2.5mb PDF) goes into more detail of the partnership and its goals. The Council expressed support for the goals of the group and asked Gipson to provide them future updates.

Prior to that main presentation, City Council also heard a short update and thank you from Greg Williams, senior vice president for economic development at the Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce.

Williams talked about the two Partnership Industrial Centers and noted that the land-acquisition note for PIC-West is now retired following the recent sale of 35 acres to NorthStar Battery for its expansion. More statistics about the PICs are available on the Chamber’s handout.

posted by Louise Whall, Public Information

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