Health Care Provider Invests in Long-Term Planning
  hen two organizations with six medical clinics in Berkeley and East Oakland
joined forces in 1996, they found that combining cultures, identities and systems takes a
lot of work and time.
With a new name, Lifelong Medical Care (LMC), the partners—Berkeley Primary Care
Access Clinic and the Over 60 Health Center—vowed to provide comprehensive health
care to all ages for the most underserved residents in their area. They hoped that the
merger would allow them to cut costs and provide services more efficiently in the face of
a changing health care environment.
  To help LMC along the way, TCWF provided a one-year,
$50,000 grant for core operating support, which was used to analyze finances and
operations, produce a business plan and provide much-needed care for their prenatal
patients.
"With this grant, we were able to get an expert to assess our business
infrastructure—everything from accounting and billing to administration," said
Martin Lynch, LMC’s chief executive officer. "From that, we’ve developed a
long-term business plan that’s helping us see more patients."
After developing the business plan, a facilities manager was hired to oversee the six
sites, along with an additional accountant and a patient services manager who has hired a
staff to handle outreach and patient recruiting and for "shepherding" new
patients through the system. Lynch said patient visits have increased from 45,000 to
65,000 a year.
"We took a risk in taking these steps before we knew where the ongoing support was
coming from, but now we don’t know how we survived [before making these
changes]," said Andra Lichtenstein, LMC planning and development director.
As the only safety-net health care provider for the Berkeley-East Oakland area, LMC is
the fastest growing medical group in the area. More than 95 percent of the patient load,
which includes a large African-American population, falls below 200 percent of the federal
poverty level.
"The consultant verified how fast we’ve grown and how critical a solid
infrastructure is to support that growth," Lichtenstein said. "The number of
uninsured patients we serve is substantial. In order to serve so many and survive, we need
sound business practices."
Primary among the community’s needs is prenatal care. There is a 4-to-1 disparity
in low birthweights between African-American and Anglo babies in Berkeley; the national
ratio is 2-1.
"LMC has an excellent record, comparable to that of private practitioners, for
birthweight rates," Lichtenstein said. "The alarming disparity in the statistics
in Berkeley shows that our services aren’t being utilized enough."
A community health specialist has been reaching out to the community to recruit
patients and provide instruction in family planning, prenatal counseling, childbirth
education, breastfeeding, parenting and infant safety.
"We still have a way to go to achieve the efficiencies necessary to survive the
challenging health care environment and serve our community," Lichtenstein said.
"TCWF provided a lifeline that’s unusual from foundations in that they furnished
general support dollars to help us get the start we needed to make the marriage between
our clinics succeed."
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