Pooled Fund Supports School-Based Health Centers
  any teens do not seek health care services because of concerns regarding confidentiality, affordability, lack of transportation or inconvenient appointment times. School-based health centers are designed to overcome barriers that inhibit young people from getting needed health care by providing comprehensive medical and mental health screening and treatment at their schools.
“Youth friendly, school-based health centers can be highly effective at reaching adolescents who tend to resist seeking treatment,” said Gary Nelson, TCWF senior program officer. “The clinics can be difficult to sustain, however, since the school-based health center staff often can’t spare time away from clients to raise funds, and they may be inexperienced at accessing reimbursement opportunities.”
  TCWF provided a $90,000, two-year core operating grant to the Alameda County Healthcare Services Agency for its Alameda County School-Based Health Center (SBHC) Fund. The SBHC Fund pools resources to provide financial support, technical assistance and evaluation services for seven adolescent school-based centers in the Alameda County area. Health centers are located in Alameda (2), Berkeley, Oakland (2), San Lorenzo and Union City. Two additional sites are planned for the East Oakland and Hayward communities. The health centers target low-income adolescents, and all
services are provided free to the client.
“We wanted to leverage and make better use of the teen services in Alameda County,” said Janis Burger, deputy director of the Children and Family Services Commission of Alameda County. “Now we do the business planning and let the school-based health centers run great clinics.”
The health centers offer general medical care, preventive care, disease management, family
planning, pregnancy prevention, health education, counseling and substance abuse prevention and intervention. High school students, as well as students who have dropped out, are welcome—as are the youths’ families.
“Unlike other states, California does not have any funds set aside for school-based clinics, and many of our preventive services are not reimbursable through Medi-Cal or other public programs,” said Anthony Santangelo, director of Berkeley High School Health Center. “The support provided through the SBHC Fund is essential to our sustainability.”
“The California Health Report” published by RAND stated that school-based health programs have demonstrated positive outcomes in preventing substance abuse, decreasing teen pregnancy rates and treating mental disorders and other health problems before they become disabling.
The seven Alameda County school-based health centers serve over 7,000 clients a year. Usually, an adolescent will access more than one service with each visit. “We are just so delighted that the youth are utilizing these services,” Deputy Director Burger said. “The services were fragmented, and we have made them much more stable.”
The SBHC Fund is one part of Alameda County’s larger health systems reform agenda. “Alameda County has a history of developing effective integration strategies so that services work more efficiently,” TCWF’s Nelson said.
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