Clergy enlisted to point way to care

Methodist Le Bonheur plan aims to help uninsured

Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare has turned to local clergy to help members of their community find basic medical services and avoid using the expensive emergency room for normal care.

It's part of the hospital's efforts to deal with the costs of treating people who lack health insurance.

But at a meeting Thursday, questions from the some of the 90 clergy present showed how big the challenge is.

Rev. Randolph Meade Walker said many people who might claim church affiliation don't come to services that often, making it harder for ministers to influence them. Victims of violent acts such as shootings and knifings are unlikely to have any connection to a church, he said.

"They are not in anybody's pew," the pastor of Castalia Baptist Church in South Memphis said. "And they need the most services."

Methodist is doing what it can to deal with an entrenched national problem, said Gary Gunderson, the ordained minister who is building the hospital group's church network, called the Congregational Health Network.

"The real answer is universal health care," he said. "We can't fix this one city at a time, one region at a time."

The session, in an auditorium at Methodist University Hospital, began with a presentation of statistics on the uninsured.

At Methodist, they're predominantly male and eight out of 10 have a chronic illness, according to an internal study from 2006.

Perhaps surprisingly, the study showed that about one-third who lack health insurance earn more than $50,000 per year. In some cases, their employers offer health insurance and they've chosen not to accept it.

The survey showed that the uninsured often aren't aware of low-cost clinics such as the Church Health Center. In some cases, they come to the emergency room in nonemergency situations. Caring for the uninsured costs more than $50 million a year now and is expected to increase to $73 million by 2013.

The presentation laid out a series of recommendations: among them, that Methodist should use its new network of 136 churches to spread the word of where the uninsured can find care.

A question-and-answer session illustrated some of the challenges. A minister from Arkansas asked if Crittenden County institutions were involved in cooperative efforts. After much discussion, it appeared the answer was no.

Several Hispanic ministers in attendance listened to an interpretation through headphones, a reminder that language barriers can also hinder health care access.

Toward the end of the session, Dr. Art Sutherland, who advocates for a single-payer health program, echoed the idea that the solution must be larger than the people in the room.

"What you're doing is fighting the symptoms of it right now," he said.

-- Daniel Connolly: 529-5296

At a glance

Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare is building up a network of churches, called the Congregational Health Network, to help pastors steer their members to health care options.

The network now has 136 members. Methodist wants to increase that to 400.