The Problem: The Coachella Valley healthcare crisis.
The Coachella Valley has a healthcare crisis due to the magnitude of insufficient
healthcare access as well as the disparities in access to care experienced by different
communities. There is an alarming shortage of healthcare providers, namely
primary care physicians in the region and even fewer who serve in communities
with high rates of poverty. For example, there is only one full time equivalent
physician serving a population of approximately 10,000 in Desert Hot Springs and
9,000 for the eastern Coachella Valley communities of Coachella, Thermal, Mecca,
and North Shore. To give a better perspective, the U.S. Human Resources and
Services Administration defines an underserved community of having one family
physician per 3,500 people. Furthermore, the current economic crisis and growing
unemployment rates have left many people without health insurance and unable to
afford basic and needed healthcare. In 2008 for example, six cities in the Coachella
Valley had double digit percentage of their population living below the Federal
Poverty Level with the highest being 45% in Mecca, 29% in Coachella, and 20% in
Desert Hot Springs. These figures are likely worse for 2010. The degree of poverty
and lack of healthcare services make communities in the Coachella Valley amongst
the most underserved areas in the state of California. Therefore, our Coachella
Valley healthcare crisis is an urgent and compelling problem in need of a collective
community-based regional solution.
The Purpose:
The purpose of the Coachella Valley Healthcare Initiative is to improve healthcare
access and wellness for all residents in the Coachella Valley.
The Plan: To create a regional healthcare access and wellness strategic plan.
The Coachella Valley Healthcare Initiative is a community-based endeavor that has
partnered with and works under the auspices of the Regional Access Project
Foundation.
Our first action to improve healthcare access and community wellbeing is to
facilitate the creation of a regional healthcare access and wellness strategic plan.
We have garnered information, support, and collaboration through many
community forums, key stakeholder meetings, and interviews involving community
residents, students, health promoters, service providers, healthcare leaders, as well
as representatives from colleges, universities, foundations, and policy makers. Over
300 participants from all communities throughout the Coachella Valley and 55
organizations were represented. They all contributed their voice in defining local
healthcare barriers and offering regional solutions. The regional healthcare and
wellness strategic plan is derived from these forums, interviews, and the research
performed by healthcare experts with a team of 20 volunteer local student leaders
attending high school, pre-med universities, nursing, public health, and medical
schools. The strategy includes a vision, a mission, a set of issues that comprise the
scope of healthcare access barriers in the Coachella Valley, the goals aimed at
remedying those barriers, strategies to accomplish the goals, and action plans for
those strategies.
The Coachella Valley Healthcare Summit
The Coachella Valley Healthcare Summit is going to be held at the Fantasy Springs
Event Center on December 17th from 8am-12pm with registration and breakfast
starting at 7am.
The summit will gather residents, students, service providers, healthcare leaders
and stakeholders, representatives of local governments, colleges and universities,
area hospitals and clinics, health insurance organizations, foundations and policy
makers, in order to:
- - Inform the community about the Coachella Valley healthcare crisis
- Distribute the Coachella Valley Healthcare Initiative Report 2010
- Finalize the regional healthcare access and wellness strategic plan
- Create action plans during workshop sessions
- Kick-off the implementation of local solutions for healthcare access and
wellness for all residents in the Coachella Valley.
We encourage discussion and collaboration amongst all participants. The
magnitude of our local healthcare crisis, the amount of people throughout the
Coachella Valley left without access to affordable services, and the health morbidity
as a result of these barriers are burdens too large for one organization to handle
alone. Therefore, through a collaborative effort, based on a strategic healthcare
access and wellness plan, we can better use our collective strengths to remedy the
problem and provide optimal healthcare access and wellness for all residents in the
Coachella Valley.
Thank you for being part of the solution,
Raul Ruiz, MD, MPP, MPH
Director, Coachella Valley Healthcare Initiative
Click Here to Register for the Summit
Summit Concept Paper in .pdf format
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