HARTSVILLE — CareSouth Carolina associate medical director Jeri L. Andrews recently spoke with the Harvard-affiliated Mobile Health Map about CareSouth Carolina’s work with mobile care in its community.
The Mobile Health Map network, www.mobilehealthmap.org, tracks the aggregate impact of more than 1,100 registered mobile clinics across the country. Mobile clinics play an important part in the movement toward equitable, value-based care by delivering a wide range of services that benefit more patients at a lower cost. The clinics tend to reach neighborhoods with high social vulnerability and disease burden and serve a racially diverse, disproportionately uninsured patient population. According to the web site, mobile clinics contribute to more than 3,200 life years saved and more than $235 million returned on investment.
CareSouth Carolina’s Moby Outreach Program is an example of the value of a mobile clinic. Moby allows CareSouth caregivers to go out into the community and deliver services everywhere — from community centers to churches to schools to store parking lots to town halls and many more places.
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The Moby, a mobile unit equipped with health care technology, allows CareSouth Carolina providers, nurses, and community health workers to operate outside the four walls of their office locations and help treat and care for patients in their own communities.
“When we visit, we ask, ‘What is it that you need?’” said Andrews, a family nurse practitioner. “They could have food insecurity or no refrigerator to keep food safe, or no electricity at all, or they could have a transportation issue. A nurse or a certified health worker can spend an hour or two at your home to assess the situation and then coordinate those resources, plus arrange for close follow-up. That’s what we’re focusing on — getting into their environment and getting them what they need. It may not have anything to do with health care. But if we fix those other issues, their health is going to improve. This is just a different way of providing care. Going to someone’s home and helping them instead of saying, ‘Come to me.’”
The Mobys were initially purchased to assist in providing increased access to COVID-19 testing during the pandemic, but can be used for a wide variety of services, including chronic care and screenings, immunizations and vaccinations.