Turning Vision Into Reality: Community Health Centers' Role in Implementing American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

The presentation will describe the impact of the $2 billion investment from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) made to community health centers and their communities

Study Design: Health Centers receiving ARRA funds submit quarterly reports to the Health Resources and Services Administration. Analysis of ARRA quarterly reports includes the number of patients served, the number of jobs created and the number patient visits, and an economic impact to assess the impact community health centers had in their communities.

Findings: Findings show community health centers have seen a total of 2,079,908 new patients and 1,167,809 new uninsured patients due to ARRA funding. Thirteen health centers from 9 states have reported seeing 11,176 new patients and 2,902 new uninsured patients with funds from CIP grants. The majority of FIP grantees are less than 50 percent complete with their projects. Nine states have achieved and surpassed their target for new patients and 23 states have surpassed their targets for serving uninsured patients. From January to March, health centers employed 7,316 health center staff FTEs and 1,519 construction-related FTEs.

Conclusions: Health centers have made significant gains providing services to new patients including those who were newly uninsured. They have played a key role in employing additional staff including construction staff. ARRA funding has provided a temporary relief to escalating costs, capacity strain and infrastructure. While health reform has built on the infrastructure investing additional funds to health centers, it has also tasked them with addressing the need of the newly insured.