Social Action Community Health System receives $99,000 grant from Alliance Healthcare
In a letter dated December 13, 1999, the Alliance Healthcare Foundation approved a two-year grant of $99,000 to be given to the Social Action Commnity (SAC) Health System.
The grant will help fund the salaries of two nurse practitioners who will provide primary care at two satellite SAC clinics located in San Bernardino and Redlands.
The Alliance Healthcare Foundation, with headquarters in San Diego, funds charitable, educational, and research programs and projects.
"We are very pleased to award these funds to SAC Health System," the letter from Ruth Lyn Riedel, PhD, chief executive officer of the foundation, reads, "and wish you and your colleagues well in this important endeavor."
The SAC Health System home base is the 42,300-square-foot SACNorton clinic, located on the former Norton Air Force Base in San Bernardino.
The health system also operates four satellite clinics, including SAC-Frazee and SAC-Arrowhead in San Bernardino; SAC-Redlands located in Redlands; and SAC-West End/Montclair, the western-most clinic, which operates in Montclair.
"We are deeply grateful to the Alliance Healthcare Foundation for partnering with us," says Richard H. Hart, MD, DrPH, president of SAC Health System and dean of the School of Public Health. "This grant will subsidize the activities of two of our satellite clinics, helping them become more self-sufficient."
For more than 30 years, SAC clinics have been providing primary health care for those in the Inland Empire who fail to qualify for MediCal and cannot afford health-care insurance.
Of the 478,000 individuals living in the service area, 40 percent are dependent on welfare. Nearly all of the census tracts served by the clinics are federally classified as medically underserved areas. SAC clinics provide low-cost (sliding fee) or no-cost health care for these individuals.
In 1995, the SAC Health System began providing full-time, low-cost, comprehensive community care with the addition of the SAC-Norton clinic.
Today, a full complement of services are available, including medical and dental (20 dental operatories); physical, occupational, and speech therapy; prenatal, immunization, health promotion, and preventive care; mental health, social work, and counseling; and services relating to sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and HIV.