Our abstract was accepted to the conference called “Patient Navigation: An Emerging Role for Community Health Workers”, scheduled for May 6, 2010. For more conference details see www.patientnavigatormass.org.

“Vida Sana” Navegantes Program: Outreach to Improve Health Care Access for the Spanish-Speaking Providence, Rhode Island Community
Vinnie Velazquez, Carlos Juarez, Luz Betancur, Santos Zacharias, Elaine Waite, Jennifer Jiminez, Gloria Rose R.N., Anne S. De Groot M.D.

Lack of insurance has a disproportionate impact on Latinos who make up just 13% of the population in the US and 10% of the population in Rhode Island (RI), but who represent 60% of the patients seeking access to free health care at the Clinica Esperanza/Hope Clinic (CEHC), a new free care clinic in RI. Latinos are 3.0 times more likely to be uninsured and 2.5 times more likely to report not getting health care due to cost than other individuals living in RI; they were also more likely to report using the emergency room as a usual source of care.

In January 2010, CEHC established a community outreach program called “Vida Sana”. Five health care Navegantes (“Navigators”) were hired to improve access to health care for uninsured, Spanish-speaking and minority CEHC clients. The goals of the Navegantes program are to: (1) Improve access to care for uninsured RI Hispanics/Latinos and minorities; (2) Train community-based Navegantes to provide linkages to health care at CEHC or to local area hospitals for free care; (3) Improve community health knowledge through health education sessions; and (4) assist with access to non-healthcare needs for CEHC clients.

The five Navegantes have received training related to patient advocacy and management of Diabetes, Heart Disease and Overweight. To date they have provided educational Diabetes workshops for 48 individual clients. The Navegantes have also helped 120 individuals to obtain acces to free tests (such as blood glucose tests, infectious disease screenings, x-rays, biopsies) at the Clinica Esperanza and six clients were brought to local hospitals in Rhode Island where they obtained free health care or free medical examinations. Both the Navegantes and their clients have benefitted from this interaction and many lessons about obtaining free access to health care have been learned. We will present some case histories and lessons learned about providing free care to Providence residents during the period January-June 2010.

More information about the Navegantes Program.