Uninsured Residents ‘High Priority’ for Western Sonoma County Coalition
The Rural Health Partnership, a coalition of health care agencies serving western Sonoma County, said Tuesday that it plans to apply for private foundation and government grants to improve health care access for the region's uninsured residents, the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat reports. With nearly 65,000 Sonoma County residents lacking health insurance or having inadequate insurance, coalition leaders determined that the uninsured are the region's "top health care priority." The coalition plans to apply for grants from the California Endowment and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to fund two programs. The first program aims to boost enrollment in Medi-Cal and Healthy Families by working with local emergency rooms to identify people who are eligible for the programs. In addition, the coalition hopes to send social workers into the community to educate residents about state-funded programs. The coalition also would use the grants to provide west county residents with transportation to medical appointments and pharmacies. The cost of the programs has not been determined. Coalition leaders based their proposals on the California Endowment's "community needs assessment" survey conducted last year (Rose, Santa Rosa Press-Democrat, 5/24).
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