MINUTES: September 27, 2016
Posted by Evans on Oct 03, 2016
President-Elect Paula Brahan presided over the meeting. Thanks to Wes Brooks who gave the invocation and to Paula who led us in the Pledge of Allegiance.
Samantha McCain and Kristy Gould served as our greeters today.
Tracie Fowler introduced today’s guests. Lauren Walker is a guest of Elizabeth Gillentine. Larry Miller is a guest of Tom Overton.
No one volunteered to give us three minute of awesome today so Sean Priebe talked about the just concluded Bike-a-Thon. He thanked all of the members who showed up before sunrise and many who had to remain beyond late afternoon. He also thanked the sponsors and noted that they are listed in this week’s SPOKES. The event generated about $13,000 for the disentangledAD organization. After known bills are paid the club should clear about $2,500. Approximately 100 riders registered for the event. Many thanks again to those who made this a successful event. Planning for next year’s Bike-a-Thon will begin in the very near future with a postmortem meeting of the 2016 event.
Paula noted that today is Toxey Morris’ birthday.
Ryan Kelly then introduced today’s guest speaker, Kathryn Rehner who is the Project director for the Mississippi Health Access Collaborative (MHAC) at the University of Southern Mississippi.
Kathryn is what is known as a “navigator”. She manages a grant that provides enrollment education and assistance for potential recipients of the Affordable Care Act as well as Medicade and CHIPS. The organization is responsible for the individuals within their 24 county service area which represents the southern-most Mississippi counties.
When Kathryn began this project a goal was established to reduce the number of known eligible recipients by 50% within the first 18 months. They actually were able to reduce the number by 86% within that time frame.
Having the ability to help begins first with a better understanding of what the barriers to area to health care in the area. The organization discovered that transportation seems to be a major obstacle in this service area. Other issues include understanding eligibility, not being able to leave work, and not having an easily accessible location to apply for care. The Medicaid application is 28 pages.
By keeping the focus of “Purpose over Politics” the organization is making a difference in our area. It is estimated that approximately 200,000 Mississippians have no way to access the health care system. A family of four must make no more than $5,000 annually to qualify for Medicaid. If that same family makes more than $24,000 they are not eligible to receive federal assistance with insurance premiums. The $5,000 Medicaid ceiling is the lowest in the nation. A primary focus of MHAC is single moms with children. Kathryn notes that 44% of families in Mississippi are in a single parent family and 91% of those are single mom families.
Of those individuals that MHAC has been able to assist, about 7.5% are self-employed. Fifty-one percent are white and forty-nine percent are non-white.
Kathryn emphasized again that their organization strives to keep Purpose before Politics and continues to operate with the belief that access to health care improves lives. To find out more about the organization or to find help for someone you may know contact Kathryn by calling her at 601-596-6859 or email her at mhac@usm.edu.