Oregon Health Authority seeks to expand health care, mental health access to reduce disparities • Oregon Capital Chronicle

The Oregon Health Authority seeks to expand access to health care, expand the state’s behavioral health system and connect more families with preventive health care.

The goals are fundamental to the agency’s goal of eliminating health care disparities by 2030. strategic plan that will guide the work. The plan spans the next three years and covers broad areas such as access to health care, behavioral health care and reproductive health.

The goal is to eliminate systemic inequities in the health care system that lead to disparate health outcomes for different communities, such as people of color, minorities, and immigrants. Injustice can lead to serious life-changing consequences, and Blacks and Native Americans have a shorter life expectancy than whites. Oregonians in rural areas struggle to get care and suffer from diabetes, heart disease and depression.

Inequity can manifest itself in different ways and contribute to a person’s overall health, including lack of access to providers, unaffordable housing or lack of translation services in health clinics.

“This injustice goes beyond health statistics,” Dr. Sejal Hathi, director of the health authority, said in a press conference. They rob people of dignity, opportunity and quality of life, and when it comes to health, we are all connected.”

The project covers five broad areas:

• Expanding the behavioral health system with more staff, preventive services for children and youth and adding more beds to treatment centers.
• Expanding access to affordable health care. This includes helping Oregonians provide information, whether it’s about the Oregon Health Plan, the state’s version of Medicaid, or the newly launched program for those who make too much money to qualify for Medicaid. The state also wants to increase the number of providers through loan forgiveness programs and increase the number of certified traditional health workers, who have cultural ties to the communities they serve.
• Increasing services to keep families healthy. This includes preventive health services, especially for new parents before and after birth and adding housing and nutrition benefits that the national Medicaid program will provide to the new program.
• Working with nine of Oregon’s most famous tribes. The agency met with tribal members and hired a consultant to help officials complete goals in this area.
• Making the health authority more responsive to a diverse workforce.

Measuring success

The authorities will track different areas to monitor their progress, for example, by cutting the number of people suffering from preventable diseases. They will also track access to health services and workforce numbers and will create public dashboards to show progress.

But the 42-page plan does not outline specific statistical goals for each area. For example, officials aim to reduce the number of people entering the emergency department for mental health visits, but it does not set a target.

When asked about the lack of metrics, Hathi said the government will monitor the performance internally.

“In addition to those high-level outcome measures for each strategy, each action has outcomes and performance measures associated with it that we will track within us with our internal operations management system,” Hathi said. “Those tend to be lighter than they would be of public interest, but we make sure to include those monitoring plans in our implementation planning.”

The plan calls for increasing the number of behavioral treatment beds statewide, but does not specify a goal of ending by 2027. The state needs 3,700 more beds, according to report published in June.

It is not clear how many beds the government can add in three years.

Hathi said the government will publish a dashboard in the coming weeks detailing the goals for the different types of beds and how many beds have been funded from 2021 to date.

Currently, the government can treat about 4,000 people in its residential facilities and plans to add about 400 more beds by the fall of 2025.

The Oregon Health Authority’s delay in responding to the drug crisis is hindering the expansion of care

The need for social support

It is not known exactly how much it will cost to achieve the goals of the plan, but most of the work will depend on the donors who will need government help. Through 2021, the Legislature has appropriated more than $230 million for mental health housing and residential treatment programs after years of low funding.

But donors have complained to the Capital Chronicle that health authorities have been slow to provide funding, particularly to “shovel-ready” projects, even though they believe the need is urgent.

Critics say it will require speeding up the authority.

Health officials will also need public buy-in, something Hathi said government officials plan to address. “In the coming weeks, OHA will issue a nationwide call to action, rallying our will and calling on our partners across state and local government, health care providers and education providers. , philanthropy and business to take bold action to advance the strategic plan,” said Hathi.

Health providers who contacted Hathi at the press conference said they were encouraged by the government’s stance. Brenda Johnson, CEO of La Clinica, an immigrant and community health provider in the Medford area, said the work is meaningful to those most affected.

“In my community, here in southern Oregon, I see the tragedies in the lives of people who have little or no access to care, people who delay care or go too far and at great cost to it. welcome,” said Johnson, who is also the association’s chairman. Oregon Health Policy Board.

The plan marks the culmination of work that began in 2019 with extensive public consultation. That work has informed the state’s response to the epidemic, with Oregon publishing metrics showing vaccination rates in hard-to-reach communities.