Fourth Annual Monroe E. Trout Premier Cares Award
Six innovative programs for disadvantaged win Cares Award
Charlotte, NC; San Diego, CA; Westchester, IL -- Innovative programs in Dade City, FL; Denver, CO; Chadron, NE; Allentown, PA; Milwaukee, WI; and Carson City, NV, giving migrant farmworkers, low-income pregnant women, and other disadvantaged persons better access to health care, recently won a total of $135,000 in cash prizes in the fourth annual Monroe E. Trout Cares Award presentation.
Sponsored by the new Premier, the largest alliance of hospitals and healthcare systems in the nation, the Monroe E. Trout Cares Award honors innovative programs serving the medically disadvantaged. One hundred and seven nominations for the award were received from healthcare organizations throughout the country. The top prize was a $50,000 cash award; five runners-up received cash awards totaling $85,000.
Primary funding for the Cares Award, named after the former AmHS chief executive officer Monroe E. Trout, is provided by the new Premier with additional funding coming from Abbott Laboratories, Becton Dickinson and Company, C.R. Bard, DuPont, Eastman Kodak Company and Johnson and Johnson.
"The Monroe E. Trout Cares Award spotlights innovative programs that help the medically underserved and focuses attention on the need to support and replicate such efforts. It also underscores the values that represent the core beliefs of the owners constituting the new Premier," said Robert W. O’Leary, chairman and chief executive officer of the new Premier.
The six winning programs were announced March 14 at the new Premier Governance Education Conference held in Orlando, FL. The event was attended by nearly 1,100 healthcare executives, board members and medical staff from hospitals and healthcare systems nationwide, as well as top executives from many of America’s leading companies. The Cares Award winners were chosen by a panel of nine national leaders selected from private industry, higher education, health care and government.
The winners are:
Farmworkers Self-Help, Inc. (FSH), Dade City, FL, ($50,000)
FSH was established in 1982 by Mexican immigrant farmworkers, Mexican-American migrant farmworkers and former farmworkers to find solutions to problems of the farmworker population. FSH seeks to preserve the Mexican culture while bridging the gap between isolation and societal mainstreams by facilitating self development, empowerment, organization and leadership. Also, the program provides emergency food, clothing, shelter and medical services to Mexican farmworkers.
Maternal Obstetrical Management Services (MOMS), ($15,000)
MOMS, a statewide program in Nevada, was started in October 1989 to reduce complications at birth for low-income pregnant women and their babies, problems caused by inadequate prenatal care. The program provides increased access to physician supervision and care, while at the same time reducing physician and community hospital concern over malpractice issues.
Perinatal Partnership, Allentown, PA, ($20,000)
In 1991, Lehigh Valley Hospital established the Perinatal Partnership, a public and private, community-based outreach program to improve access to comprehensive perinatal services. The primary goal of the program is to reduce low birth weight and infant mortality through improved health care for low-income women, with emphasis on Latinos and battered and homeless women and their infants the first newborn well check and immunizations.
Prenatal Care Coordination Project, Milwaukee, WI, ($15,000)
The Prenatal Care Coordination Project at Sinai Samaritan Medical Center seeks to improve birth outcomes of low-income women. The program provides comprehensive services in the areas of risk assessment, care planning, ongoing care coordination and monitoring, health education, nutritional counseling, social support, and referrals for medical care, substance abuse, family violence and public health programs. The program has succeeded in increasing the number of first trimester prenatal visits by 40 percent, decreasing the occurrence of low birth weight by 34 percent and decreasing the number of NICU days required. It also has demonstrated an average healthcare savings of $810 per birth.
Rural Partnership for Children Project, Chadron, NE, ($25,000)
The goal of the Rural Partnership for Children Project is to improve healthcare access and coordination and quality of services to children with special healthcare needs. Since July 1991, 50 monthly pediatric consultation clinics have been held serving 330 children.
Samaritan House Pediatric Center, Denver, CO, ($30,000)
The two-year-old Samaritan House Pediatric Center is a free health services center for homeless children. The center meets the health needs of medically underserved children by concentrating on three areas: direct care, parental education and research.
The center is staffed by volunteer physicians, nurses, dentists, audiologists, psychologists, counselors and administrators.
The recent merger of American Healthcare Systems, Premier Health Alliance, Inc., and The SunHealth Alliance, creates the largest voluntary healthcare alliance covering all 50 states. With offices in Charlotte, Chicago, San Diego, and Washington, D.C., the new Premier includes more than 240 owner systems that own or operate 650 institutions as well as another 1,000 affiliated hospitals. Annual purchasing volume is projected at more than $10 billion. Additional savings to members’ supply purchases is projected to be a minimum of $400 million to $500 million each year.