PDF of the statement: NCCHCA Statement on Passage of Medicaid Expansion March.22.2023

2022 NCCHCA Clinical Conference Draft Agenda

(Click for Registration Page)

Wednesday, October 19

Thursday, October 20

Friday, October 21

Continuing Education

In partnership with Northwest Area Health Education Center (AHEC), a program of Wake Forest University School of Medicine and part of the NC AHEC System.
Up to 9.25 Contact Hours and 0.9 CEUs from  Northwest AHEC

> Day 1 – Oct. 20, 2022 • 0.5 CEUs from Northwest AHEC • 5.25 Contact Hours from Northwest AHEC

> Day 2 – Oct. 21, 2022 • 0.4 CEUs from Northwest AHEC • 4.0 Contact Hours from Northwest AHEC

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Wednesday, October 19^th

Heavy hors d’oeuvres will be served while you enjoy choosing from three activities at the Benton Convention Center Piedmont:

• Stewart Knight, a full-time local artist, will be our Wine & Design teacher for the evening, and he’s ready to bring out the artist in our guests. Whether you’re a novice or expert, this is your opportunity to paint a cool picture on canvas or t-shirt while sipping a drink of your choice.
• Enjoy working on a complicated puzzle? We got it! We have a 2,000-piece puzzle ready to tickle those brain cells and make you think before placing pieces on the board. We hope attendees can complete this puzzle before our 2023 Primary Care Conference.
• Calling game night lovers! We have a collection of board games, from Monopoly to Scrabble to What Do You Meme, ensuring you and your conference colleagues will have an enjoyable time.

Thursday, October 20^th

Networking event at Foothills Brewery Footnote, 634 W. 4th Street Ste. #120, Winston-Salem

Signature cocktails, wine, craft beer await our conference attendees and vendors with a special dinner menu that’s been created for those hungry taste buds.

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This project is supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of an award totaling $1,557,131 with 99 percent financed with nongovernmental sources. The contents are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by HRSA, HHS or the U.S. Government.

***Media Release*** 

August 8, 2022 

Contacts: Stacie Borrello, NCCHCA Communications & External Affairs Manager |  borrellos@ncchca.org, 919-996-9208; Brendan Riley, NCCHCA VP, Government Relations & External Affairs | rileyb@ncchca.org, 919-469-1116                     

Expanding Medicaid Would Increase Community Health Center Reimbursement Revenue by 32% on Average, New Analysis Finds 

Passing Medicaid Expansion Would Create Jobs in the Health Care Workforce and Expand Care Access in Rural and Underserved Communities 

Click to view and download the August 2022 Issue Brief: More Than an Insurance Card: How Medicaid expansion will increase the services of NC Community Health Centers and improve health outcomes. 

A new analysis of North Carolina Community Health Center data released this week shows that expanding Medicaid would not only directly benefit individuals gaining coverage, but it would also significantly increase revenue for North Carolina’s Community Health Centers (CHCs), allowing health centers to expand services and serve more patients. On average, net increases in reimbursements to CHCs would jump by 32.2 percent annually—for health care services they are already providing to their uninsured patients.  

CHCs play an important role as safety-net providers in medically underserved communities. While these Centers do their job well with limited resources, they face challenges because North Carolina has not yet expanded Medicaid. While CHCs are the provider of choice for hundreds of thousands of insured patients, an average of 40 percent of CHC patients are uninsured, putting a strain on CHC operating budgets. 

Because CHCs are required to reinvest all non-grant funds into programs that expand care access for the medically underserved, expanding Medicaid will promote financial stability for these critical safety net providers and allow them to increase capacity. 

“Under Medicaid expansion, we would be getting an additional $3-4 million a year in revenue from Medicaid. Those are dollars that Federally Qualified Health Centers will reinvest into new services and new practice locations,” said Chris Vann, chief development officer at CommWell Health, a Community Health Center with sites in five counties throughout the southeastern region of North Carolina. 

Medicaid expansion would also enable CHCs to make investments in expanding access to care by recruiting more providers to rural communities and expanding service lines like behavioral health and Medication Assisted Treatment (MAT) services. 

“With Medicaid expansion, we can add comprehensive specialties such as cardiology, podiatry, or ophthalmology practices to support our patients with comorbid conditions that we see frequently, like hypertension and diabetes,” said Scot McCray, CEO of Advance Community Health in Raleigh. 

By keeping patients out of the ER and preventing hospitalizations, CHCs help reduce health care spending by approximately 29 percent per patient per year, making health centers a remarkable investment for health care dollars. 

“While we understand that some lawmakers are concerned that expanding Medicaid would create a strain on provider capacity, our research shows that Medicaid expansion would, in fact, bolster our providers’ capacity. Medicaid expansion would mean that our Community Health Centers, who now serve a significant portion of uninsured patients, would receive reimbursements for care that was previously uncompensated, allowing health centers to increase capacity by hiring more staff and expanding programs to serve more patients,” said Brendan Riley, NCCHCA’s Vice President of Government Relations & External Affairs. 

For a detailed look at how Medicaid Expansion would impact Community Health Centers and their patients, refer to the North Carolina Community Health Center Association’s August 2022 Issue Brief: More Than an Insurance Card: How Medicaid expansion will increase the services of NC Community Health Centers and improve health outcomes. 

About CHCs: Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs), also known as Community Health Centers (CHCs), which provide integrated primary medical, dental, pharmacy, behavioral health, and enabling services to more than 743,000 people in the state, regardless of their insurance status or ability to pay. By mission, Community Health Centers provide high-quality care in rural and medically underserved communities and to vulnerable populations, and as such are the backbone of the primary care safety net in North Carolina.

About NCCHCA: The North Carolina Community Health Center Association represents 42 Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) member organizations that provide integrated medical, dental, pharmacy, behavioral health, and enabling services to more than 743,000 patients at over 370 clinical service sites in 85 N.C. counties.

Click the link to view and download the two-page Issue Brief: More Than an Insurance Card: How Medicaid expansion will increase the services of NC Community Health Centers and improve health outcomes

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www.NCCHCA.org | 4917 Waters Edge Drive, Suite 165, Raleigh, NC 27606 | 919-469-5701 

***Media Advisory*** 

August 4, 2022 

Dozens of Sites Celebrate National Community Health Center Week, August 7-13 

Federally Qualified Health Centers to Host Public Officials, Hold Ribbon Cuttings, Provide Free Health Services, and Engage in Public Outreach 

Who: The North Carolina Community Health Center Association (NCCCHA), which represents 42 Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) member organizations that provide integrated medical, dental, pharmacy, behavioral health, and enabling services to more than 685,000 patients at over 370 clinical service sites in 85 N.C. counties.  

Contacts: Stacie Borrello, NCCHCA Communications & External Affairs Manager | borrellos@ncchca.org, 919-996-9208; Brendan Riley, NCCHCA VP, Government Relations & External Affairs| rileyb@ncchca.org, 919-469-1116 

National Health Center Week, August 7-13, 2022, is an annual, nationwide celebration of Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs), also known as Community Health Centers (CHCs), which provide integrated primary care services to the entire community regardless of insurance status or ability to pay at over 370 sites across North Carolina. The goal of the week-long event is to raise awareness about the mission and value of CHCs and celebrate the contributions of staff, stakeholders, and — most of all — patients, who make up a majority of all CHC governing boards. CHCs across the state are holding over 30 public events in celebration: 

• Four CHCs are celebrating the opening of new sites: Triad Adult and Pediatric Medicine in Greensboro, Cabarrus-Rowan CHC in Salisbury, Agape Health Services in Plymouth, and Mountain Community Health Partnership in Burnsville. 
• Many CHCs are holding public events where they will perform health outreach with special populations, which include migrant farmworkers, public housing residents, the unhoused, and children.  
• Several sites are hosting elected officials or their representatives for tours as part of stakeholder recognition efforts, and others are participating in community-wide wellness fairs across the state. 

The North Carolina Community Health Center Association encourages press to attend public events during National Health Center Week to report on the innovative ways our CHCs provide high-quality primary care and enabling services to underserved communities, furthering their mission of improving health outcomes and reducing health disparities.

Click here for a list of the public National Health Center Week Events happening across North Carolina next week. (Click the page numbers at the bottom to view all events.)

Learn more about National Health Center Week at https://healthcenterweek.org. Please reach out to the NCCHCA contacts above for more event details or assistance connecting with a CHC. 

At the 2022 Primary Care Conference in Wilmington, the North Carolina Community Health Center Association (NCCHCA) held an awards luncheon to honor a bi–partisan group of lawmakers who have consistently advocated for the needs of Community Health Centers and our patients.  

The Association presented N.C. State Senator Jim Perry (R-Lenoir, Wayne) with our Community Health Advocate of the Year Award, which is presented to lawmakers who have made significant contributions toward the development and support of Community Health Centers and the communities they serve within the past year.  Thanks to Senator Perry’s leadership, North Carolina has enacted protections for affordable medications and other critical Community Health Centers services made possible through the 340B drug discount program.  

NCCHCA also recognized three retiring members of Congress with the Association’s Community Health Champion Legacy Award, which honors their longstanding service, dedication, and advocacy on behalf of Community Health Centers and the patients and communities we serve across North Carolina.  

This year’s Community Health Champion Legacy Awardees were: 

• U.S. Senator Richard Burr (R-NC)
• U.S. Congressman G.K. Butterfield (D-NC01)
• U.S. Congressman David Price (D-NC04) 

While they were not able to attend the luncheon in person, the honorees accepted their awards with pre-recorded remarks that were played for attendees.

While we took time to reflect on our shared accomplishments and express gratitude to those policy makers who share our mission, we also looked ahead to our future policy goals, which include expanding Medicaid, protecting the 340B Drug Discount Program, and enhancing Community Health Center funding to support the expansion of needed programs such as increased behavioral health services. 

The Association Notes the Transformative Impact HB 149 Will Have on Patient Care and CHC Operations

The North Carolina Community Health Center Association applauds the N.C. Senate’s passage of HB 149, which would expand Medicaid coverage to hundreds of thousands of uninsured North Carolinians and strengthen the state’s Community Health Centers (CHCs), which provide comprehensive primary care services in rural and medically underserved communities without regard to patients’ ability to pay.

Medicaid expansion is the single most transformative state policy the N.C. General Assembly can enact to increase health care access and strengthen the primary care safety net. “Not only will Medicaid expansion help Community Health Centers enhance and expand the services we provide to medically underserved communities, but it will also enable hundreds of thousands of our state’s residents to live healthier lives with more secure access to the care they need,” said Reuben C. Blackwell, IV, President and CEO of OIC of Rocky Mount and Chair of the NCCHCA Board of Directors. “For the sake of our patients and our health care providers, it’s crucial that the North Carolina General Assembly take this important step of expanding Medicaid.”

Statewide, 40 percent of CHC patients are uninsured, while uninsured rates for individual health centers are as high as 70 to 80 percent. When CHCs lack reimbursement for the essential services they provide, it strains their operating budgets and prevents them from expanding their capacity to reach more patients. Expanding Medicaid would also save patients the burden of living with worsening health conditions because they fear the cost of seeking treatment.

In addition to improving health care access and outcomes for patients, Medicaid expansion would generate increased revenue for CHCs, enabling them to hire more clinical staff, extend the availability of services into new areas of the state, and expand needed programs, such as addiction treatment, mobile medical units, and dental services.

We applaud the N.C. Senate for this historic action and call on N.C. House Speaker Tim Moore and the rest of the N.C. House delegation to pass Medicaid expansion to deliver the health care solutions that are vitally important to the health and economic well-being of our state.