Join us for Hoops & Scoops at the Conway Public Library Park on Wednesday, August 7 from 4:30-6 pm at the Conway Public Library Park to celebrate National Health Center Week. Trails End’s ice cream truck will be serving complimentary ice cream, and Family Nurse Practitioner Josie Lamb, APRN will be leading and teaching hula hooping. Billing Assistant Gisella Gambino will also be teaching Latin dance moves and there will be a houseplant giveaway. Community Health Worker Erin White will be hosting a resource table and answering questions about the organization.
New this year, Margie Riforgiato, APRN will be leading some exercises from the Arthritis Foundation’s Walk With Ease Program, as a preview for the 6-week class she will be offering later this year to help those with arthritis be physically active while reducing pain and discomfort.
Community Health Worker Erin White will be hosting a resource table and answering questions about the organization.
National Health Center Week, held annually by the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC), recognizes the critical work of the nation’s nearly 1,500 Community Health Centers to keep our communities healthy and safe. The event highlights the essential role Community Health Centers (CHCs) have played for the past 60 years in improving public health and providing Americans equal opportunity to access critical healthcare services. CHCs represent the nation’s largest primary care network, serving 32.5 million patients nationwide.
With a mission to make high-quality, affordable care available to everyone, regardless of their insurance status or ability to pay, CHCs save lives and reduces healthcare costs on the front lines of our nation’s most pressing public health challenges. They are powered by a workforce of over 310,000 dedicated professionals who reach beyond the walls of the exam room with effective services that not only prevent illness but also address the factors that may cause it.
CHCs are racing against a September deadline as their federal funding expires, creating unprecedented financial strain. Additionally, the recently enacted "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" is projected to cost CHCs $7 billion annually in higher uncompensated care costs and jeopardize coverage for 4 million patients. While CHCs never turn patients away, anticipated Medicaid coverage reductions from both state and federal changes to the program will force impossible budget choices. The National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC) projects these combined pressures could lead to workforce cuts and site closures, resulting in up to 6,000 preventable CHC patient deaths annually.
Interim Executive Director Julie Everett Hill, RN explained, “Cuts to Medicaid will have far-reaching consequences for our patients, our health centers and hospitals, and our communities. When people are unable to afford access to medicine or basic health care, illnesses and chronic conditions that could have been managed by a routine visit to a primary care provider grow into larger issues that require more expensive hospital-based care. Approximately 40% of our patients are insured by Medicaid, and another 11% are uninsured. The possibility that nearly half our patients are at risk of having limited or no means to pay for healthcare is deeply concerning.”
White Mountain Community Health Center is Mount Washington Valley’s local CHC. The organization fosters community-wide health through quality and compassionate services. As a Federally Qualified Health Center Look-Alike (FQHC-LAL), it meets all the service and quality requirements a full FQHC meets, but doesn’t receive the federal grant that full FQHCs receive. This grant is designed to help CHCs provide these services to everyone regardless of ability to pay, but the number of sites that can receive the grant is limited by the amount of federal funding Congress chooses to appropriate. This lack of funding makes it more difficult for the Health Center to expand what it offers the Mt. Washington Valley community.
The first CHCs were established 60 years ago as part of President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty. Affordable access to healthcare continues to be an essential piece of fighting poverty because chronic disease and medical debt can interfere with the ability to hold a job and build a stable and comfortable life. People who can’t easily access preventive care often wait until medical issues are severe to seek help, which leads to worse outcomes, such as cancer that isn’t diagnosed until it’s in later stages, or heart conditions that require immediate surgery and a long recovery, lowering quality of life and adding to preventable deaths.
By improving access to preventive care and treating the whole person, CHCs save the nation’s health system billions of dollars annually and prevent thousands of deaths. They also improve the health and wellbeing of millions of people who would not be able to access healthcare if they did not exist.
National Health Center Week celebrates these benefits that CHCs bring to our local community and to our nation’s health and financial wellbeing, and highlights the importance of continuing to support and expand this program.
The Health Center is accepting new patients for adult and pediatric primary care, dental care, sexual & reproductive health services, behavioral health care, dietitian services, and substance use disorder treatment. Their Teen Clinic is open to any teenager with walk-in hours Wednesday afternoon. The organization makes sure that everyone in Mount Washington Valley can access these services through a generous sliding fee scale and other programs that remove barriers to care.
Join the health center in celebrating healthcare everyone in our community can access with free ice cream, hula hooping, and more! For more information, visit their website at whitemountainhealth.org, follow them on Facebook or Instagram, or call them at (603) 447-8900.