| COMING UP |
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Uniform Data System, Jan. 8, 9 QTS, Leadership Session, Feb. 27, 7:30 am - 1:30 pm QTS, Quality Institute, Feb. 27, 1:30 - 4 pm |
In this Issue
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Welcome to Senior Policy Coordinators Kimberly Keymer and Caleb Gilchrist. Welcome to Aza Nedhari, Project Specialist – AWI; and AWI Project Assistants Melissa Salinas and Kevin McNeill. Welcome to Cathy Morales, Director of Community Health Access and the AmeriCorps Community HealthCorp participants. Welcome to Linda Gardiner, RHIO Project Intern. |
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| Policy and Advocacy | |||
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Medical Homes DC |
Health Centers Left Out of Emergency Preparedness Study The report – Ready or Not? Key Findings from the Nonprofit Roadmap to Preparedness for the National Capital Region – that examines the disaster readiness of the area’s 4,000 human service groups, was released in October 2008. This two-year study of the area’s nonprofit community was paid for and written by Deloitte, a global consulting firm, and the Nonprofit Roundtable of Greater Washington, a membership association. The report calls on relief organizations to expand their mass care capacities, develop methods to care for pets, better manage volunteers, and strengthen mental health services. Of the 81 nonprofit organizations interviewed for this report, only one community-based health center in the District was included: Community of Hope, Inc. In fact, the 13 other health centers that are DCPCA members were not represented at all. In the Friday, October 24, 2008, edition of The Washington Post, staff writer Philip Rucker wrote in “Nonprofits Poorly Prepared for Disasters, Study Says” that relief organizations – food pantries, health clinics, shelters, and volunteer centers – need to create a regional communications system, improve capacity for long-term recovery efforts, and strengthen partnerships with other agencies, governments, and businesses. And yet, community health centers in the District have begun to do just that – completing their all-hazards emergency operations plans back in 2007 and attending quarterly meetings, organized by DCPCA, with the DC Department of Health’s Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Administration. These meetings have served as a method of establishing greater ties between the health centers and local partners and as a means of exchanging information, educating, training, and addressing critical issues. Not including community health centers in the Deloitte report was a significant oversight, considering that health centers represent a critical network of care in the metropolitan area. In fact, officials have long recognized that health centers will take on an extensive response and recovery role in the event of a natural disaster or terrorist attack, as the walking-wounded and worried-well will surely wind up at their doors. The total oversight of the activities and partnerships that the District’s health centers and DCPCA have established only re-emphasizes the continued need to highlight our achievements and advocate for further collaboration with the capital region’s emergency preparedness community and its major stakeholders so that not just one, but all fourteen health centers are included at all times. |
