A fair health system
By Mark Masselli                                                                                                        May 3, 2007
Mark Masselli is the President and CEO of Community Health Center, Inc.

It was thirty-five years ago this month that a small group of us in our late teens and early 20's set out to make Health Care a Right and Not a Privilege in our hometown. Starting with our dreams and a small second floor walk-up, we converted the two bedrooms into medical exam rooms and, with help from the physical plant staff at Wesleyan University, renovated the kitchen into a Dental operatory. Volunteers all of us - dentist, physicians, Wesleyan students, activists, friends and neighbors--we opened one of Connecticut's first Free Clinics. Today's organization may bear little resemblance to our early years, but we are still fresh with the idealism to make better the current health system.
The Community Health Center, Inc. has continued to grow through new generations who believe in the cause and do the work of transforming the way that health care is delivered, especially for those who need it most. From our simple beginnings, CHC is now a corporation with over 100 service locations, with Health Centers in 12 cities and over 90 schools and community sites. Today 70,000 of your neighbors call us their Health Care home, receiving Medical, Dental or Behavioral Health Services - as well as many other essential supportive services. We will provide about a quarter-million visits this year alone to those who have no health insurance and those whose health insurance doesn't provide the coverage they need.
Our tradition at CHC has been one of innovation, in always questioning whether we could do better in our quest for health care justice. Perhaps our first transformation at the Health Center was when we decided to resist the conventional wisdom that a "clinic" doesn't have to keep a high standard in either appearance or the excellence of its services. Instead, we realized that the respect we hold for our patients must be reflected in how professional our facilities are and by the expertise of our staff. In any CHC office today, you will find a modern and welcoming design and state of the art equipment, staffed by the best and the brightest.
Those who decide to make their career at CHC do so because they want to help build a health care system that is fair and just. Our commitment to our patients is not just about access and affordability although we are proud of those attributes. Today, our drive to give our patients the best possible care has led us to focus on improving health outcomes. Today's health problems are more complicated by changes in our society - so we have to change and innovate to stay ahead. We have Connecticut's first state-wide Electronic Health Record, and our clinician's expertise has moved from basic primary care to being primary care specialists for Chronic diseases; Obesity, Diabetes, Asthma, Oral Health and Depression. These chronic problems require interventions that are informed by evidence-based medicine and interventions that are designed to engage patients in self-management. We know that a patient's involvement in their own health care can be a major contributing factor to improved health outcomes.
A natural extension of this patient involvement is that our organization is consumer governed which means our bottom line is about meeting the needs of our patients. To accomplish this we have worked hard to build collaborative relationships with private practitioners, hospitals, Universities, Community Organization, and concerned citizens that help us with our health transformations. Their participation brings fresh ideas and insights into how best to shape individual and community medicine that is both local and yet a national model.
We all want a health system that reflects our country's commitment to equality and justice for all but we understand that this won't be won at the lottery and it requires more than political support. A world-class system of care will need to engage Americans from all walks of life and draw on the critical thinking and imagination that makes this a great country.
©www.MyRecordJournal.com 2007