News

REPORT OF POLK COUNTY'S UNINSURED

A Blue Ribbon Steering Committee was convened in Oct. 2004 to examine how hospital-sponsored health care is currently delivered to the uninsured in Polk County. The Committee’s goal was to create a participatory process to plan an effective and sustaining model to deliver core safety net services tot eh County’s uninsured. To assist them with the tasks, researchers from The George Washington University’s School of Public Health and Health Services, Department of Health Policy, were retained to conduct an assessment of hospital-sponsored health care services delivered to Polk County’s uninsured. The assessment is designed to highlight key issues affecting access to care for uninsured and underinsured residents, and to present potential policy options for the restructuring hospital-based services in the county. Specifically, the assessment:

  • Identifies the amount of hospital-sponsored health care that is delivered to the uninsured in Polk County;
  • Provides information on the relative contribution of each hopital organization in the overall delivery of health care services to the uninsured in Polk County;
  • Complies existing data on costs associated with delivering these services;
  • Describes gaps in service delivery for uninsured residents of Polk County; and
  • Examines the impacts of having major safety net hospital in the community, and the potential impact of the absence of such a hospital.
This assessment was conducted between Oct. 2004 and Jan. 2005.
Click here to read the full report.