Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 30, Number 4, 1 ʻApelila 2013 — Renewed focus on community health centers [ARTICLE]

Renewed focus on community health centers

Stories and photos by Harold Neelel

n an encouraging sign for community heahh centers across the state, the federal government has set its sights on providing a major boost to their efforts to care for the unmet needs of thousands of hard-hit families. Nationally, community heahh centers stand to benefit from an estimated $9 billion that President Obama's administration has specifically budgeted to sustain, improve and expand them under the new heakh reform law. The expected boost comes at a time when the Office of Hawaiian Affairs is working closely with various community heahh centers across the state to fight obesity, a critical heahh eoneem that has been a top policy priority. The strengthened focus on community heahh centers also coincides with Nahonal Minority Heahh Month in April, whieh is designed to draw widespread attention to efforts to provide comprehensive heahh care to people who face the greatest barriers to accessing care, including a laek of heahh insurance or transportation. For many Hawaiians, community heahh centers are a major source of care that ranges fromprevention to treatment of chronic diseases like obesity, whieh is linked to a laek of proper nutrition and physical activity. Take, for example, three community heahh centers that OHA is partnering with through Nā Eimahana o Eonopūhā Native Hawaiian Heahh Consortium: Waimānalo Heahh Center, Wai'anae Coast Comprehensive Heahh Center and Kōkua Kalihi Valley Comprehensive Family Services. Fast year, these three sites together delivered care to 19,226 Native Hawaiians, who accounted for about 42 percent of their patients. And since 2009, nearly $800,000 in OHA grant money has helped provide stability to these three heahh centers that increasingly more Native Hawaiian patients are relying on for primary care as well as help adopting healthier habits. Already, the Wai'anae Coast Comprehensive Heahh Center reports that of the 500 to 1,000 new patients it attracts eaeh year, more than half are Native Hawaiians.

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