First Lady Michelle Obama has announced release of $14.6 million in grants to community health centers in Oregon. The money will be spent on renovation, repair and new construction.

In all, $852 million is being distributed nationwide. The money comes through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act at a time when more Americans are joining the ranks of the uninsured due to the economic downturn and skyrocketing health costs.

“Community Health Centers provide care to the Americans who need it most and their work has never been more important,” Obama said. “These grants will help centers in Oregon serve more Americans who simply can’t afford insurance coverage any more.”

Oregon’s share is being allocated among 25 health care centers.

The roster includes the Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center, which operates five clinics in Washington County and one in Yamhill County. It is getting $1.1 million to fund a switch from paper to electronic records at clinics in Cornelius and McMinnville.

CEO Gil Muñoz said those two are the last ones to make the switch. The organization plans to start with the Cornelius transition in the fall, with the McMinnville transition to follow in February.

“Ultimately what it will do is improve the quality, the safety of the care we deliver to our patients as well as the efficiency,” Muñoz said. “Our current system with paper records is really a fairly inefficient system. It’s difficult to get information out without having to do hand audits of charts”

He said it also will make it easier to coordinate care with other providers.

“Whether it’s the hospital, specialists, a laboratory, it’s very difficult to do with paper records. That’s why there’s a big push with health care to digitize the records, and it improves the efficiency, too.

“If we have to hunt down a paper chart and figure out whose desk the chart is on, that’s wasted time within the system. It makes the patient wait longer, it makes the provider wait longer so he is not able to see as many patients and it makes bottlenecks in the system.”

The health centers deliver preventive and primary care services at more than 7,500 sites. They serve patients regardless of ability to pay, with charges varying according to income.

Community Health Centers are the responsibility of the Department of Health and Human Services’ Health Resources and Services Administration. They serve more than 17 million patients, about 40 percent of whom have no health insurance.

Muñoz said that Oregon’s high unemployment rate is driving up demand for services substantially. The clinics are designed to help people who have the most difficulty obtaining primary medical care.

“About 50 percent of our patients are uninsured and we have more than 90 percent of our patients below 200 percent of the federal poverty level,” he said. “So we have people who are either uninsured or covered under the Oregon Health Plan.

“And then we have more than 60 percent of our patients who are non English speakers. So we have a large minority population that we serve.”

Muñoz said, “We’re getting calls daily from individuals who have lost their jobs, lost their health insurance and are looking for access to primary care for some very basic but crucial issues; their heart medication, diabetes medication. Unfortunately, there is a much larger demand for services than we are able to provide.

“Our capacity is about 30,000 patients. Just within our service area of Washington and Yamhill counties, there are over 90,000 uninsured people in need of primary care access.”

The Capitol Improvement grant awards are the third set of health center grants provided through the Recovery Act. On March 2, President Obama announced grants worth $155 million to establish 126 new health center sites. Those grants will provide access to essential preventive and primary health care for more than 750,000 people in 39 states and two territories.

On March 27, HHS also awarded $338 million in Increased Demand for Services grants for health centers. Health centers are using these Increased Demand for Services grants to provide care to more than 2 million additional patients over the next two years, including approximately 1 million uninsured people.

Some of the funds the Virginia Garcia Center has received are being used to hire more staff, in order to see more patients, Muñoz said. The clinics also have extended their hours.

“So we are, through the federal funds increasing our capacity. But not at the rate that is sufficient to really address all of the needs in the community. It’s a big problem for the community still and for the whole state,” he said.

Muñoz said the actions of the state legislature provided some relief for desperate families, however.

“We are hopeful that we are looking at some significant improvements in access, in health reform, as seen through the last legislature in Oregon, the expansion in the number of kids covered under the Oregon Health Plan, up to 65,000 more kids,

and also an increase in the number of adults who are covered, another 35,000 individuals will be added to the Oregon Health Plan standard program,” he said. “So that doesn’t completely solve our issues in the state, but it’s a significant step forward.

“We’re excited and hopeful about that, as well as the movement at the federal level to try and come up with a comprehensive health reform package, to address issues of access and quality and cost.”