Streamlining the Screening of Uninsured Residents

Having just received a large federal grant to increase access to health care for residents of SW Brooklyn, Lutheran Health Care's Jim Stiles pulled together a coalition of nearly 400 community-based and faith-based organizations to help him solve one of the community's most intransigent problems: the growing number of uninsured children and adults. As one of NYC's most innovative health care leaders, Jim knew he wanted to find a technology solution to this challenge and called in NPower NY to help him think through his options. Among the many goals he set for the initiative was a solution to the massive amount of  paperwork that is currently exchanged to screen and enroll individuals in health insurance as well as the development of a marketing tool for his coalition members.

With an alliance of organizations as vast as the one Jim put together, a web-based solution to the screening and enrollment challenge was most apparent. It was agreed that a website that could facilitate the screening of individuals for insurance eligibility would be an important first step to eventually bringing the entire enrollment process online. In addition Jim wanted the site to enable alliance members to showcase themselves to each other and the community atlarge to enhance referrals among individual agencies. And finally, he wanted the site to bring together the clinical staff within the alliance to share best practices and clinical protocols for serving an inner-city population. NPower NY crafted a Request for Proposals that described the requirements for the website and managed the bid review process that led to the recommendation of a large web development firm. NPower NY will be overseeing the work of the firm as well as assessing the infrastructure needs of the first pilot group of alliance members and assisting with the installation of necessary hardware and training.

"We always had a vision of what we wanted to do," says Jim Stiles, the Executive Director of Lutheran Health Care, "but until we engaged NPower NY , our vision could not be implemented because we simply didn't have the technology skills on staff. The NPower NY staff was tremendously helpful in translating a very technical project into lay language, so all members of the alliance could understand where we were headed."