My Job

Put yourself in my position: it's college graduation, you look down at your diploma from Sweet Briar and see the little sticker on the outside that says Salyer/BA Philosophy and Sociology. Panic starts to hit-What the HELL am I going to do with a degree in Philosophy and Sociology. What does this mean-well it means I know how to think and interact with/study people...hmmm. OK Folks! This is my first attempt with writing a blog entry on a topic on the complete opposite end of the spectrum in terms of house renovations! I’d thought I would start out with by talking about my job! Why? Well for several reasons-I love it, I love it, and I love it. When you meet someone new one of the first questions either you ask or “new person” asks is “What do you do?” My response 9 times out of 10 warrants a raised eyebrow and a head tilt in either confusion or what I like to call the “uh oh” face. My title here at The Virginia Community Healthcare Association is “Government Affairs Specialist”. I think the reason for confusion or the “uh oh” face is that people think I’m going to dive right in to politics-especially the future of health care. I’m not going to lie-I might give someone the “uh oh” face to if I was in a public setting, having a pleasant conversation and someone told me they wanted to discuss the future of healthcare in this country! I’m not going to go ahead right now and give you my opinion (that’s for another entry) but mainly because I’m straying from the topic. So what does a Government Affairs Specialist do at the Virginia Community Healthcare Association? My quick answer is A LOT! The state of Virginia has 29 Community Health Centers that operate in 110 sites all over the state. VCHA is the same organization for our state that Oregon Primary Care Association is to Oregon. Each state has a PCA (primary care association) that assist the FQHCs (Federally Qualified Health Centers) with grant writing, policy updates, establishing clinical programs, and technical support to maintain the high quality of care that each CHC (community health center) provides! My job has 2 avenues: policy and advocacy. The policy side of my job is challenging but people say-there is no better way to learn something unless you get thrown into the lion’s den! That is exactly what I’ve had to do! I spend time downtown speaking with the General Assembly, specifically the health care and appropriations committees. I need to make sure our Association is aware of every budget/healthcare bullet point in each brief, statement, amendment etc. I also hang out with VA’s congressmen and 2 senators. If you follow closely, VA Senator Marc Warner was one of the original “gang of 6” as they called it on the hill several months ago when 3 republicans and 3 democrats first started working on a budget agreement. Like I said before this part is very challenging but there are a lot of perks! I mean not everyone gets to hang out in Washington or Richmond with the suits that run our country. Can you say you’ve had a conversation with Eric Cantor? (Most of you know me well enough that he’s NOT someone I brag about talking to if you catch my drift…) So in short I communicate legislative updates to our 29 health centers. The other part of my job is the reason I LOVE working here-Advocacy. Most of the time (especially in this current time) our health centers are fighting for funding from state and federal levels funding to these health centers means more clinical programs, more staff, more hours, more up to date technology. I’m going to digress and talk you through what is in a typical health center. Central Virginia Community Health Center is located about an hour and a half away from Richmond in a small town called Buckingham. Buckingham is 50 minutes away from UVA medical center and 1 hour and 45 minutes away from VCU medical center. So where do people go when they need to see a doctor? CVCHC! One of the philosophy’s of CHCs is to provide quality primary care services over a long term period to prevent patients driving straight to the emergency room at a hospital if they don’t feel well. Some of the primary care services include: diabetes management, smoking cessation, weight loss management, mental health services, and dental services not to mention well child visits, pre-natal care, mammograms, school physicals and immunization days. CVCHC provides all of these and more including their very own pharmacy! One of the advocacy words we throw around to people is access. It’s very important to me as a “lobbyist” to let people know how many rural areas that Virginia has! We use the terms MUA and MUP standing for Medically Underserved Area and Medically Underserved Population because there are more than you would think here. The other portion of advocacy is to educate people on what an FQHC is-you would be surprised about how many people think CHC’s are the same as a Free Clinic. WRONG. We just updated our website –this particular page describes more in depth what I’m trying to say. I strongly encourage you all to read over the lists. http://www.vacommunityhealth.org/about_chcs.cfm

I hope you enjoyed reading this and got to know a tiny bit of what I do.