Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient and FIU professor Dr. Pedro José “Joe” Greer Presents Proposal at 2009 Congressional Black Caucus Health Braintrust


 

Friday, September 25, 2009 – 2:50 pm to 4:00 pm
Washington Convention Center, Room 146B
Washington, DC

MIAMI – Dr. Pedro José “Joe” Greer, chair of the Department of Humanities, Health & Society at Florida International University’s Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine, will join the2009 Fall Congressional Black Caucus Health Braintrust as a guest panelist to help raise awareness about the health care reform bill and its effect on individuals, communities, providers and businesses.

At the session, themed Using Health Care Reform to Create Community-Centric Efforts, Greer will join health care stakeholders from across the nation to explore the critical role that health care reform can play in supporting community-centric health equity efforts that have already been successful at improving the health care and health outcomes of some of the nation’s most underserved communities.

During his remarks Greer will present a proposed amendment to health care legislation. Dr. Greer’s proposal calls for five designated universities throughout the United States to develop prototype approaches to community-based health care, a priority of Congress and the Obama administration in their efforts to overhaul the health care system. The proposed amendment specifies that groups of students from across academic disciplines, such as medicine, public health, social work and nursing, “adopt” one or two households in underserved populations for the entire course of their education, providing primary care and teaching best health practices to families.

This approach, which is modeled after FIU’s Medicine and Society and NeighborhoodHELP concepts, promises to reduce health care costs by reducing emergency room visits, improving health literacy and increasing preventive care. It will also help to mitigate costs associated with providing insurance for the presently uninsured and underinsured. Several means to reduce health care costs through community-based health care have been identified, but they have not yet been tested or benchmarked for effectiveness, which is what this proposal attempts to accomplish. The new College of Medicine at Florida International University already has the structure in place to begin testing this approach. 

Other speakers at this session also include: Dr. Willarda Edwards, President, National Medical Association; Dr. Natasha Williams, Associate Attorney, Bailey and Glasser, LLP.;Jennifer Deng-Pickett, Director, DC Language Access Coalition; and Dr. Janna Andrews,Assistant Professor of Radiation Oncology, Indiana University School of Medicine.

Attendees will have an opportunity to participate in a moderated Q&A following the presentation.

Media Contact:  John Prieur at 305-448-2930 or John.Prieur@rbbpr.com.

-FIU-

About the Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine:
The College of Medicine was approved in 2006 by the Florida Board of Governors and the Florida Legislature. In 2008, it received preliminary accreditation by the Liaison Committee for Medical Education of the AAMC and admitted its first class in August 2009. Among the innovative elements of the FIU College of Medicine is a program called NeighborhoodHELP™, which will send medical students along with their counterparts in social work, nursing and public health, into the community. The FIU College of Medicine is expected to have a multi-billion-dollar economic impact on Miami-Dade County, bringing thousands of jobs to the area and eventually contributing millions to the state coffers every year. For more information visit http://medicine.fiu.edu/

About FIU:
Florida International University was founded in 1965 and is Miami’s only public research university. With a student body of more than 38,000, FIU graduates more Hispanics than any other university in the country. Its 17 colleges and schools offer more than 200 bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral programs in fields such as engineering, international relations and law. FIU has been classified by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching as a “High Research Activity University.” In 2006 FIU was authorized to establish a medical school, which will welcome its first class in 2009. FIU’s College of Law recently received accreditation in the fastest time allowed by the American Bar Association.

 

  

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