| Community Budget Issue Requests - Tracking Id #280 | |||||||||
| Manatee County Rural Health Services - Indigent Pharmaceutical Program | |||||||||
| Requester: | Mickey Presha | Organization: | Manatee County Rural Health Services, Inc. | ||||||
| Project Title: | Manatee County Rural Health Services - Indigent Pharmaceutical Program | Date Submitted | 1/14/2003 10:48:29 PM | ||||||
| Sponsors: | Galvano, Reagan | ||||||||
| Statewide Interest: | |||||||||
| This program will directly impact the lives of thousands of citizens throughout the Tampa Bay region and ultimately impact the health status of the state. Effective health care must go beyond the physician office visits and diagnosis. Many of the patients of MCRHS have no means to acquire the proper medications needed to restore them to good health. This program especially benefits the state because many of the patients we serve are highly mobile (i.e. migrant workers) and could carry health problems to others because of conditions that are contagious. Proper medical treatment will isolate and eliminate many of these problems and ultimately benefit other areas of the state. | |||||||||
| Recipient: | Manatee County Rural Health Services Inc. | Contact: | Mickey Presha | ||||||
| 12214 US Highway 301 N. | Contact Phone: | (941) 776-4000 | |||||||
| Parrish 34219 | |||||||||
| Counties: | DeSoto, Manatee | ||||||||
| Gov't Entity: | Private Organization (Profit/Not for Profit): | Yes | |||||||
| Project Description: | |||||||||
| Manatee County Rural Health Services, Inc., is a 501C(3) non-profit, federally-qualified health center. The organization currently operates eight community health care centers in Manatee and DeSoto counties, with plans underway to open a center in Sarasota in early 2003. MCRHS currently serves an active patient base of more than 35,000 people per year and provides more than 120,000 patient encounters per year. Many patients have no means of paying for health care. They are self-pay patients who are not eligible for Medicaid, Medicare, or any other public assistance program. Additionally, most of these patients do not have private health insurance through their employer. This project is intended to create a program modeled after the Prescription Drug Purchase Assistance program. MCRHS would establish an in-house prescription plan with seed money of $250,000. The $250,000 pool would then be used to assist patients without a prescription plan with their medication purchases by offsetting prescription drug prices. Patients confirmed to have no funding source would be supplemented from this financial pool for the price of medications. The goal is to use the pool for approximately 50 to 75 percent of the prescription cost, and have the patient co-pay be from 25 to 50 percent of the total price of the medication, based on their financial status and a sliding fee scale. The sliding fee scale will be based on the federally-established poverty guidelines. MCRHS operates four full service, in-house pharmacies. MCRHS has a sophisticated software program that identifies each patient's profile when they come for pharmancy services. We require all pharmacy customers to sign in and become part of our database. Office staff and financial counselors verify at each office visit the current financial and insurance status of each patient. MCRHS has implemented and managed a similar program called the Prescription Drug Purchase Assistance (PDPA) program. MCRHS has all the components in place to operate this program successfully and efficiently. The only remaining component is the seed money for the program. | |||||||||
| Is this a water project as described in Chapter 2002-291, Laws of Florida? | No | ||||||||
| Measurable Outcome Anticipated: | |||||||||
| MCRHS feels that as many as one-third of its patients will enjoy increased access to proper medications. Proper treatment and medication should have a measurable impact on health in Manatee County. | |||||||||
| Amount requested from the State for this project this year: | $250,000 | ||||||||
| Identify item(s) in the FY 2003-04 Appropriations Bill to be reduced: | |||||||||
| Specific Appropriation #: | |||||||||
| Specific Appropriation Title: | |||||||||
| Amount to be reduced: | $ | ||||||||
| Total cost of the project: | $250,000 | ||||||||
| Request has been made to fund: | Operations | ||||||||
| What type of match exists for this project? | None | ||||||||
| Cash Amount | $ | ||||||||
| Was this project previously funded by the state? | No | ||||||||
| Is future-year funding likely to be requested? | Unknown | ||||||||
| Was this project included in an Agency's Budget Request? | Unknown | ||||||||
| Was this project included in the Governor's Recommended Budget? | Unknown | ||||||||
| Is there a documented need for this project? | Yes | ||||||||
| Documentation: | Through Nov. '02, 81,000 prescriptions were filled: 55 percent had no funding assistance. | ||||||||
| Was this project request heard before a publicly noticed meeting of a body of elected officials (municipal, county, or state)? | Yes | ||||||||
| Hearing Body: | Manatee County Legislative Delegation Hearing | ||||||||
| Hearing Meeting Date: | 12/16/2002 | ||||||||