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December 8, 2011 - Palo Alto Medical Foundation/Sutter Santa Cruz Physicians Raised over $6,000 for Healthy Kids 


George Mendoza (SMSC), Mark Riley (PAMF), Jordan Turetsky (HIP), and Rama Khalsa (Santa Cruz County HSA)

Sutter Maternity & Surgery Center (SMSC) and the Palo Alto Medical Foundation Santa Cruz (PAMF Santa Cruz) recently presented a check in the amount of $6,467.25 to Healthy Kids of Santa Cruz County. The proceeds come from a golf tournament conducted annually by doctors and employees. Organizing the effort is a labor of love for George Mendoza, an SMSC employee who has served as volunteer tournament director for many years. PAMF Santa Cruz and SMSC are the single largest individual donors for Healthy Kids, giving over $1 million dollars since 2002.

July 26, 2011 - Pediatric Vision Group Mental Health Mixer and Directory

In an effort to improve the integration of mental health services into pediatric primary care, the Pediatric Vision Group (PVG) held a Pediatric Mental Health Mixer on July 26, 2011 at the Community Foundation of Santa Cruz County. This mixer was attended by more than 80 local pediatric physical and mental health care providers who had chance to meet and develop collaborative relationships. Attendees mingled and enjoyed appetizers and local Bargetto wine on the rooftop terrace at the Community Foundation. 

PVG has also been working on creating a new pediatric mental health directory to aid physicians in referring their patients to a mental health specialist. A draft of this directory was available for review at the mixer. The directory will include contact information, philosophical approach and specialty areas for each provider.  It is designed to be a tool to help pediatricians develop relationships with mental health providers on behalf of their patients.

The Pediatric Mental Health Mixer was a fundraiser for Healthy Kids of Santa Cruz County. The mixer was generously sponsored by American Medical Response (AMR), Central California Alliance for Health (CCAH), Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, Palo Alto Medical Foundation (PAMF), Sutter Santa Cruz, and Physicians Medical Group of Santa Cruz County (PMG).  These sponsorships and donations from attendees helped raise over $6,000 for the Healthy Kids program which will provide health coverage to 1,500 local children. The Healthy Kids program ensures access to comprehensive medical, dental, vision and mental health services for low-income children

November 19, 2010 - HIP Annual Board Meeting

The backdrop for this meeting discussion was the set of changes that are already taking effect as part of the health care reform legislation passed earlier this year -- the Affordable Care Act. Participants identified a familiar roster of challenges, from our currently fragmented system, to the lack of primary care providers, to incentive systems that favor tests and procedures over the kind of education and counseling that might keep people healthier in the first place.

These problems are complex and extend far beyond our county, but we have a lot of talent and creativity in our community that can drive local innovation and progress. For example, we can develop and implement specific changes that will improve the coordination of care for both patients and providers -- changes such as improvinghealth information technology, creating better patient self-management education programs to help people with chronic conditions such as diabetes, and helping people connect to a "medical home" for ongoing health care.

We can "bend" the steeply escalating curve of health care costs by studying and learning from other communities that have succeeded in lowering health care costs without compromising quality or access, by engaging different players [such as employers, unions and health plans] in discussions about health care costs and quality, and supporting promising studies and practices such as pilots that allow terminally ill patients to choose palliative hospice care without giving up their treatment options.

We can make our entire community healthier overall by focusing on the health and well-being of our oldest and youngest residents, recruiting more primary care providers and advance practice nurses to the area, setting up nurse-run clinics, and expanding school-based health centers.

September 17, 2010 - Palo Alto Medical Foundation/Sutter Santa Cruz Physicians Raised over $10,000 for Healthy Kids

Sutter Maternity & Surgery Center (SMSC) and the Palo Alto Medical Foundation Santa Cruz (PAMF Santa Cruz) recently presented a check in the amount of $10,607 to Healthy Kids of Santa Cruz County, a health insurance program for uninsured and underinsured children in Santa Cruz County.  The proceeds come from a golf tournament conducted annually by doctors and employees.  Organizing the effort is a labor of love for George Mendoza, an SMSC employee who has served as volunteer tournament director for many years.  PAMF Santa Cruz and SMSC are the single largest institutional donors for Healthy Kids, giving over $1.3 million dollars since 2002.  Many thanks!

2009 Health Care on the Back of a Napkin with Dan Roam 

In November, 2009, HIP's annual forum featured Dan Roam, best-selling author of the Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures.   Roam is a communications specialist who uses simple pictures to explain and solve complex problems.  His Health Care on the Back of a Napkin presentation was named "World's Best Presentation 2009" by Business Week, and our audience of 150 community leaders engaged in a lively discussion of Roam's pictorial deconstruction of national health care reform proposals.  Dan reminded us that "whoever can best explain the problem, can best solve the problem."  The event also raised over $12,000 for HIP's Healthy Kids program.  For more info on Dan, see his website.