This is a health care desert for people without insurance.
]]>It is one of the few things in the bill that I liked.
I would love a few clinics around here, and don’t care if they are for-profit, because going to the Emergency Room if you need a prescription for something and can’t get a doctor’s appointment, is too damn expensive and a waste of resources, including my time.
I have used them all over world, literally, and just walking in, explaining the problem, and getting a ‘script was worth the expense even when I was covered by various plans.
As near as I can tell, the problem in many places is that they can’t get paid by insurance companies.
]]>From Aug, 2010
The Affordable Care Act provides $11 billion to bolster and expand community health centers over the next 5 years.
* $1.5 billion will support major construction and renovation projects at community health centers nationwide.
* $9.5 billion will:
o Create new community health center sites in medically underserved areas; and
o Expand preventive and primary health care services, including oral health, behavioral health, pharmacy, and/or enabling services, at existing community health center sites.
Next week, $250 million is being made available to support the establishment of approximately 350 new community health center sites in fiscal year 2011. The expansion of community health center sites and services will make affordable, cost-effective, high quality preventive and primary care services available to nearly twice as many people regardless of their insurance status or ability to pay; and will create thousands of direct employment opportunities in many of the country’s most economically distressed, low income communities.
Community health centers are poised to play an essential role in the implementation of the Affordable Care Act. In particular, community health centers emphasize coordinated primary and preventive services or a “medical home” that promotes reductions in health disparities for low-income individuals, racial and ethnic minorities, rural communities and other underserved populations. Community health centers place emphasis on the coordination and comprehensiveness of care, the ability to manage patients with multiple health care needs, and the use of key quality improvement practices, including health information technology. The community health center model also overcomes geographic, cultural, linguistic and other barriers through a team-based approach to care that includes physicians, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, nurses, dentists, dental hygienists, behavioral health care providers, case managers and health educators.
…
more..
http://www.healthcare.gov/news/factsheets/increasing_access_.html