SV Herald – Health Care in Rural Cochise County

However, there are many other areas without treatment facilities or even without medical professionals to help provide health care services for county residents — Bowie, Sunsites, Pearce, Dragoon, Winchester Heights, Portal, and so forth.

And if you think about the distances residents of these communities have to travel, you have to wonder how they access the health care system…especially if they don’t have transportation.

Fortunately, we have the services of the Chiricahua Community Health Centers Inc. (CCHCI) available for these residents.

On the national scene, the community health centers were part of the 1960s War on Poverty and have grown from there. They basically are 501 (c)(3) organizations with 51 percent of the governing board being individuals receiving services from the center.

Starting in Elfrida in 1996, our local community health center, CCHCI, has developed into the  largest primary care clinic service in southeast Arizona. With three clinics in the Sierra Vista area, one in the Bisbee area, and three in the Douglas area, CCHCI employs 270 dedicated individuals. It treats approximately 28,000 patients per year through its various clinics and outreach services.

I had the opportunity to visit with one of CCHCI’ s  employees — a nurse practitioner — at a mobile clinic that was in the Willcox area, and her enthusiasm and patient commitment was refreshing to behold. As she explained, no one goes untreated at these clinics, and the concern she expressed for her patients was gratifying. I asked her what some main problems were and she said, diabetes, depression, and farm work related injuries.

The mobile clinics are in essence  converted RV’s which have two examining rooms along with peripheral service facilities. CCHCI has five of these mobile units, one of which was recently purchased with a grant from the Legacy Foundation.

The mobile clinics often park in the high school parking lots on days they visit the various communities.

But the service provided is not totally complete — for  a mobile service that is sorely needed is dental care.

The good news is that AHCCCS does cover children under 21. The bad news is that the reimbursement rate is so low that dentists are reluctant to see these patients.

Coverage for patients over 21 is restricted to care related to a medical condition. So what happens? Patients in distress often go to a hospital emergency room to get some relief from the pain caused from a dental problem but the hospital is not necessarily reimbursed for the costs.

One of the services CCHCI would like to provide residents of Cochise County is mobile dentistry. The challenge faced by CCHCI is that it doesn’t have a mobile dental clinic.

It seems to me that this problem could become a worthwhile cause for the many community organizations  in the county — Rotary, Kiwanis, MOAA. CCHCI is a tax-exempt organization so individuals could use the tax credit or charitable contributions features of income tax to make a contribution towards the purchase of a mobile dental clinic.

One thing in undertakings of this nature is that someone or some organization has to step forth and get “the ball rolling”

Any takers?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lanny A. Kope, EdD has been a hospital trustee for over 30 years, serving on urban and rural hospital boards. He is the immediate past Board Chair of Sierra Vista Regional Health Center  and has had a national responsibility as Chair of the American Hospital Association’s Committee on Governance. Dr. Kope is also an University of Phoenix faculty member in Health Care.