Community Health Council

CHC was formed in 2003 by executives from local hospitals, safety net clinics, public health and health foundations as a response to findings published from the Mayor's Access to Healthcare Commission Report. Committed to the foundational purpose of improving access to healthcare for the uninsured and medically underserved, CHC initially focused on issues related to inter-clinic communications and access to specialty care. Within the first year of existence, CHC was able to get several Wyandotte County safety net clinics set up on KC Care Link, which is a coordinated care platform which allowed clinics to communicate with each other regarding shared patients. Within three years, CHC co-created the WyJo Care network of specialty care physicians that would provide free, difficult to access care to the uninsured and medically underserved; provided seed money for the Swope Health Services Dental Clinic and introduced a chronic disease management model for diabetes patients seeking treatment at local safety net clinics. In 2008, CHC's Board of Directors made the decision to pursue the expansion of federally qualified health services in Wyandotte County and after several years of collaborative negotiation, Swope Health Services established an expanded FQHC presence in Wyandotte. In 2013, CHC expanded its mission of improving access to healthcare to include the improvement of health for the entirety of Wyandotte County. Shortly after securing a new director to support the expanded mission, CHC launched Enroll Wyandotte - a collaborative, grassroots educational outreach and enrollment assistance campaign to reduce the ranks of Wyandotte County's uninsured population. From this unprecedented approach, Wyandotte County's population of residents without health insurance has been reduced by over 40% since the fall of 2013. In 2014, CHC was tapped by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) as the lead agency to direct the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) grant to reduce obesity, diabetes, heart disease and stroke in Wyandotte County.