Colorado’s Newest Community Health Center Welcomed to CCHN

NEWS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 5, 2015

Contact:

Maureen Maxwell, CCHN
(303) 867-9530
(303) 913-9078 (mobile)
Maureen@cchn.org


Colorado’s Newest Community Health Center Welcomed to CCHN
Board Votes Unanimously to Make Marillac Clinic a Member

Denver, Colo.—The Colorado Community Health Network Board of Directors voted unanimously at their meeting today to welcome Marillac Clinic as CCHN’s newest member. Marillac, located in Grand Junction since 1988, was newly designated as a federally qualified Community Health Center (CHC) in May 2015.

As a federally qualified CHC, Marillac received a grant from the U.S. Bureau of Primary Health Care that will help Marillac expand to care for as many as 12,600 patients, up from the current 6,800. The grant will also help Marillac to serve patients from birth to death, an expansion from previously serving only patients 18 to 64 years old. Grand Junction community leaders, the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, Kansas, and St. Mary’s Hospital, founded Marillac over 27 years ago to deliver medical services to uninsured people, using a small staff and many volunteer providers. Today, Marillac provides not only primary medical services but also mental health, dental, and optical services.

“We are thrilled with Marillac Clinic’s designation as a federally qualified Community Health Center. Their model of care and approach to serving patients is a great fit for the CHC model, and Marillac has done inspiring work for years for the residents of Mesa County,” said Annette Kowal, president and chief executive officer of CCHN, the association of Colorado Community Health Centers.

“This year is the 50th anniversary of the Community Health Center program. Like many of Colorado’s other Community Health Centers, Marillac has been providing high quality primary health care to people who would not otherwise have had access to it. We have partnered with Marillac in many ways over the years and were happy to work with them as they explored the Community Health Center model. We look forward to working with them as the Community Health Center movement moves forward.”

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To learn more about Marillac Clinic, please visit https://marillacclinic.org/en, or contact Kristy Schmidt, Community & Donor Relations Director, Kristy.Schmidt@sclhs.net, (970) 298-2877.

To interview Ms. Kowal, please contact Maureen Maxwell at (303) 861-5165, ext. 259, cell 303-913-9078, or Maureen@cchn.org.

The Colorado Community Health Network (CCHN) is the unified voice for Colorado’s 19 Community Health Centers (CHCs) and their patients. CHCs provide a health care home for more than 650,000 of their community members – more than one in eight people in Colorado – from 61 of the state’s 64 counties. Without CHCs, hundreds of thousands of Colorado’s low-income families and individuals would have no regular source of health care. CCHN’s mission is to increase access to high quality health care for people in need in Colorado. For more information about CCHN, please visit www.cchn.org.