Viewpoint: Celebrating National Health Cener week

Laura Salazar

This August 3-9 is National Health Center week! Partnership Health Center is one of the nation's 1,500 Community Health Centers delivering essential care to all who enter our clinics, regardless of insurance status or ability to pay.

For decades, bipartisan members of Congress have supported health centers because the results speak for themselves. Health centers demonstrate that when we focus on what works, we can build programs that truly serve the public good.

Health centers provide high quality, comprehensive, and integrated preventive and primary care services to 32.5 million people. Together, we are the backbone of the nation’s primary care system, saving the healthcare system money by reducing chronic diseases and costly hospital visits.

Health centers are not just healers; we are innovators who look beyond medical charts to not only prevent illness but also address the factors that may cause poor health, such as poverty, homelessness, substance use, mental illness, access to nutritious food, and unemployment.

We are a critical part of the U.S. healthcare system and collaborate with hospitals, local and state governments, social, health, and business organizations to improve health outcomes and reduce healthcare costs. For 60 years, health centers have been dedicated to making quality and affordable healthcare available to everyone in the communities we serve. In Missoula County, Partnership Health Center proudly serves 18,000 patients annually, and nobody is denied care due to inability to pay.

The health center mission is crucial today because access to care remains a challenge to over 100 million people across the country.

Community Health Centers are essential to healthcare in Montana and across the United States. When Montanans access affordable, high-quality care and comprehensive services at clinics like Partnership Health Center, the benefits ripple throughout our communities. Healthy workers show up ready to drive our state's economy forward, healthy students arrive at school prepared to learn and develop into tomorrow's workforce, and accessible preventive care helps people avoid serious health problems that would otherwise burden both families and our entire healthcare system with unnecessary costs.

So how can you help support the health center movement to ensure all people have access to affordable healthcare? First, spread the word! You may know someone avoiding healthcare because they are uninsured or otherwise fear the cost. At PHC, nobody is denied care due to inability to pay, and we provide a sliding fee scale that adjusts costs based on income (in other words, if you make less, you pay less). This means that healthcare is truly within reach for everyone in Missoula.

Second, choose a Community Health Center for your own healthcare needs. When folks in our community choose PHC for their primary medical, dental, behavioral health or pharmacy needs, they strengthen our ability deliver care to those with limited resources, and they bolster our capacity to provide innovative programs like our street medicine team or our school-based behavioral health program.

This National Health Center Week, show your support for the health center movement. Your action can help ensure that people all across Montana and the nation have access to the healthcare they need to thrive.

Lara Salazar is the Chief Executive Officer at Partnership Health Center in Missoula, MT.