Covering the gap for uninsured children

18,000 kids in Sonoma County have no health care
insurance
by BERT WILLIAMS -Staff Writer
Eighteen thousand children in Sonoma County are not covered by
medical insurance. Thirty-five thousand Sonoma County kids are in
need of dental care and uninsured. The crisis would be worse than
it is were it not for hundreds of health care professionals
treating kids in their offices without charge through an
arrangement with the non-profit organization, Children’s Healthcare
Network (CHN).
In 1998 the Sonoma County Medical Association (SCMA) decided
that it needed to do something to help the county’s uninsured
children. The Association recruited physicians who were willing to
treat kids free of charge during their normal office work day.
There were 80 cases of health care professionals helping children
during the program’s first eight months in 1998 and 99.
From that modest beginning CHN has grown rapidly. Between July
2001 and June 2002 over 700 contacts between patients and providers
were coordinated by CHN. From July to November 2002 there were more
than 100 contacts per month, and the numbers continue to climb.
CHN’s goal is to serve at least 2,000 children each year.
“It’s ironic that in the past some physicians thought they had
to go out of the country to find and treat medically needy kids,”
CHN board president, Dr. Robert Schultz, wrote in a recent
fund-raising letter. “Now they realize we have many children that
need care right in our own community.”
The Children’s Health Network has now stretched beyond SCMA’s
oversight. In March 2002, with the Medical Association’s blessing,
CHN became an independent, self-sustaining non-profit agency,
organized under state 501(c)3 guidelines. The board of directors
has grown from its original group of five physicians to 20 members
representing the wider community.
The Redwood Empire Dental Society (REDS) voted in March 2002 to
actively support CHN, and began recruiting its members to volunteer
their services to kids. At the end of October, 42 dentists were
participating in the program. CHN’s goal is to have 250 physicians
and 150 dentists volunteering their services to kids by July
2003.
Children in need of health care are referred to CHN through
schools and other child service agencies. By last month all 132
elementary and middle schools in the county had joined the Network.
Fifty-three non-profit service agencies including Alliance Medical
Center, Catholic Charities, HeadStart, Jewish Family and Children’s
Services and the North Bay Regional Center had joined the
organization.
“This makes my job a whole lot easier,” said Barbara Thomas,
school nurse with the Healdsburg Unified School District. “I can
just call them (CHN) and say, this is the need, this is the child.
They contact the doctor and make the appointment.”
“One of the positives is that they are able to get an
appointment for a child on the same day, and if need be they
provide transportation. All their services are with local
physicians and dentists unless a specialist is not available,”
Thomas said.
“It’s a great program,” said Laurie Mauney, secretary at Mattie
Washburn School in Windsor. “I’m thrilled every time I can make a
referral … The feeling you get when a child comes back the next day
with a prescription they needed is phenomenal.”
“Our goal is to match the kids to the most appropriate care
provider,” said CHN Executive Director Daniel Trifone. That is
becoming easier as more doctors and dentists join the program.
Pharmacy and vision services are also rapidly growing elements of
the program.
Mauney said she hopes CHN’s services will become more widely
known. “There are a lot of families who are not aware that this
exists,” she said. “It’s not just for the child who is here at
school. It’s for their baby brother, or their older sibling
too.”
CHN seeks not only to care for children’s immediate health
needs. The organization also refers families to the most
appropriate no-cost or low-cost health insurance program available
to them. There are four insurance possibilities for children under
age 19.
Begun initially with seed money from SCMA and the Pacific
Foundation, the Children’s Health Network is now seeking to
solidify its financial base and assure a stable future. To
accomplish this goal it is initiating a three-year fund-raising
campaign that will combine large matching grants with local
giving.
Over the past few years the Headlands Foundation has contributed
$165,000 to CHN. The Foundation has now offered a new matching
grant of $250,000 and nominated CHN for the Robert Wood Johnson
Foundation’s (RWJF) Local Initiative Funding Partners Program.
If CHN is selected for this program, it will be eligible for a
$500,000 RWJF grant that must be matched by other sources. The
Headlands Foundation’s $250,000 will provide half of the match. The
rest must come from local fund-raising efforts.
Trifone said that CHN is seeking grants from other local
foundations, corporate partnerships, and personal and corporate
donations in order to reach the goal.
The minimum goal is $250,000 over three years. But Trifone
entertains larger dreams. His hope is that the fund-raising effort
might net $250,000 in local donations each year for the next three
years. If that happens, and if the RWJF grant is forthcoming, CHN
will reach Trifone’s ultimate three-year goal of $1.5 million.
Schultz noted that it is easier to attract seed money for
beginning new projects than it is to fund their continued
existence. “We’ve built this infrastructure,” he said. “We can
continue to provide more services with only incremental cost
increases … It’s very important now to have funding sources that
will allow the Children’s Health Network to continue.”