Health Reform 

Health reform in redwood country

Partner: 
Times-Standard
Summary: 

Health reform is on its way to low-income residents of rural California, including Humboldt and Del Norte counties along the northern coast. A consortium of 34 rural counties has applied to participate in the “Bridge to Health Reform,” a $10-billion federally financed expansion of statewide public health coverage. While backers are convinced it will save health care services in these sparsely populated, budget-challenged counties, skepticism abounds among Redwood Country health professionals that the new health order is not tailored to their needs.

Results
Rural providers weigh in on health care reform
John Gonzales and Donna Tam | April 25, 2011
As she treated the lower body paralysis of Donnice Hildreth, who is anxiously awaiting the results of a San Francisco neurosurgical evaluation, Dr. Kate McCaffrey could not restrain her skepticism of a program launched in March to bring federal health reform to rural California. It includes the ambitious goal of providing a coordinated medical plan similar to an HMO for waves of lower-income patients like Hildreth in the far corners of Humboldt and Del Norte counties. “Reform as outlined is far too simplistic and not tailored to the needs of rural communities,” McCaffrey said. “The lawmakers didn’t have small-town America in mind.”
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Results
Who qualifies
John Gonzales and Donna Tam | April 25, 2011
Under the rules of the “Bridge to Health Reform” free health coverage provided by the County Medical Services Program, or CMSP, will be offered to people earning up to 100 percent of the federal poverty level, or $22,350 for a family of four. Significantly, enrollees will no longer have to pay a share of costs, akin to a deductible, that was commonly $300 a month. The counties may be able to expand the program at a later date to people earning as much as 133 percent of the federal poverty level, or $29,726 for a family of four. But with limited enrollment staff and primary care doctors in rural areas, county officials didn’t want to open the program to too many people at once.
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Results
At a glance: County Medical Services Program
John Gonzales and Donna Tam | April 25, 2011
The County Medical Services Program is a relatively obscure indigent care provider that was established in 1983 to enable smaller, rural California counties to deliver health care services to poor adults. The program, whose members include 34 counties with populations under 300,000, is funded through vehicle license fees, sales tax and county general revenue. Since 1995, setting CMSP policy has been in the hands of the agency’s 11-member Governing Board, made up of county officials and one non-voting state official. Currently, none of the members is from Humboldt County; one is from Del Norte County.   
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Results
Isolated clinic brings reform model to Redwood Country
John Gonzales and Donna Tam | April 25, 2011
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