FINGER LAKES HEALTH SYSTEMS AGENCY ABOUT US "Community health planning used to be based solely on bricks and mortar. Now, it is the bridge between supply and demand - ensuring people get the right care, at the right time, and the right place." - Fran Weisberg, FLHSA Executive Director FLHSA's Role As the only fully functioning health systems agency in New York State, FLHSA provides a "community table" where all stakeholders - physicians, hospitals, consumers, employers, insurers, business, labor and others - can come together to debate and resolve critical health-care issues. The agency also collects and analyzes data from payers, providers and government, which is used to inform state reviews of Certificate of Need applications. FLHSA deals with all aspects of cost, quality and access to health care - and on solutions designed to reduce the demand for health care - while ensuring adequate supply. While our planners do not provide care, their work can help save lives by ensuring the availability of essential services. Community Health Planning...Born in Rochester FLHSA evolved from the "Patient Care Planning Council," a group that created community health planning in Rochester, N.Y. in 1960. Marion Folsom, a Kodak executive and President Eisenhower's Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, convened the Council to address a single community-health issue. He agreed to chair a capital campaign for Rochester's hospitals, on the condition that the committee also study hospital-bed use and the need for new beds. The result was a 70-percent decrease in the number of hospital beds sought by the hospitals. Today, health planning helps communities and state governments avoid a sledgehammer approach to health reform. It provides a process for identifying a community's health needs and then matching resources to meet those needs. Reforming the Rochester Health-Care System FLHSA is helping to make health-care reform happen in the Greater Rochester region, by engaging stakeholders and the community, setting realistic performance targets, and measuring an reporting results. Our critical work, centered on improving system performance, capacity management and community health, includes: Community Health System 2020 Commission. The recommendations of this commission will save millions of dollars in the local health-care system. FLHSA convened this esteemed group of health, business, labor and community leaders in 2008, which came together to balance the needs for hospital modernization against what the community could afford. The result: Monroe County's three major hospitals will add a combined 152 acute-care hospital beds - a signaficant reduction from their combined request of 278 additional beds, saving millions of dollars in annual operating costs. 2020 Performance Commission. This follow-up to the original 2020 Commission is focused on reducing unnecessary hospital stays and non-urgent emergency room visits by 15-25 percent. This commission's work is a broader effort to create a high-performance, health-care system through greater collaboration among stakeholders, reduced health disparities, viable community hospitals, and improved system effectiveness. Len Redon, vice president of Western Operations at Paychex, is the chair, and Rochester Business Journal President and Publisher Susan Holliday is the vice chair. Sage Commission (Aging Services). Co-chaired by Nazareth College President Daan Braveman and Lifespan President/CEO Ann Marie Cook, this group is charged with creating a long-term vision of integrated health services for the aging population. Special attention is being given to ways to minimize disparities in health status and improve access to appropriate care. Community Engagement. FLHSA professionals organized and staff more than two dozen committees, commissions, ad hoc groups and coalitions focused on a broad range of health issues, ranging from the uninsured to preventing lead poisoning. Through community engagement, FLHSA uses its independent, "honest broker" status to lead diverse groups to consensus about ways to address tough community health issues. African American and Latino Health Disparities. Through its Health Coalitions, FLHSA engages a diverse group of African American and Latino leaders to identify community health needs, set priorities and design solutions that eliminate health disparities. Informed by these Coalitions' work, FLHSA recently completed studies that identified the health status, disparities and barriers to care that exist among the local African American and Latino communities. Health Status Studies. FLHSA produces studies on various health-care topics that help the health care community make decisions on critical issues. The agency shares health-status information with affected populations, and then works with community leaders and organizations to set priorities and to develop the action plans that will drive individuals to improve their health. CTTAB. FLHSA staff supports the Community Technology Assessment Advisory Board, which conducts independent analyses of new or expanded medical services, technology and major capital expenditures. Since its inception in 1993, this insurer-funded entity has saved the Rochester community millions of dollars in proposed capital investment that it deemed non-essential. A New York State Model Our success in community health planning has been recognized by the New York State Department of Health. Based on the work of FLHSA's 2020 Commission, the state is currently reviewing its Certificate of Need process. The State DOH referred to our 2020 Commission process as "new, exciting and innovative...FLHSA's creation of the 2020 Commission, with their visionary, relentless advocacy for collaboration, community reinvestment, and involvement of virtually every stakeholder impacted by these projects, provided the foundation for innovation and, eventually, hospital buy in." A Future Model for National Reform FLHSA is committed to helping communities in the Finger Lakes region more actively manage change in the health system and to help educate consumers how to be more accountable for their own health - to ensure the right care, at the right time, and at the right place. We believe that our local experience is a microcosm of what is possible at the national level, and what is happening in Rochester can serve as a new model for national health-care reform. FLHSA BOARD OF DIRECTORS About Us | Publications | Data Sources | CON Review Log | Staff | Directions | Links Projects | 2020 Commission | Sage Commission | African-American HC | Latino HC Last update: 1 February 2010 | Contact