(HARTFORD, CT) – The Connecticut Office of Health Strategy (OHS) announced today that it has approved, with conditions to ensure healthcare access, the Yale New Haven Hospital (YNHH) Certificate of Need application to terminate outpatient primary care services. The New Haven Primary Care Consortium, a newly-established partnership between Yale New Haven Hospital, the Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center, and Fair Haven Community Health Center, will provide continued access to primary care services for the 25,000 residents currently served by YNHH. Cornell Scott-Hill Health and Fair Haven Community Health, both federally-qualified health centers, will lease new office space from YNHH at 150 Sargent Drive in New Haven, within two miles of the YNHH York Street and St. Raphael campuses.
OHS Executive Director Vicki Veltri said, “Preserving access to healthcare was a key consideration in this application—particularly related to women’s reproductive healthcare and how the location of the new facility impacts patient travel times. OHS was deliberate in efforts to condition the application so that women’s healthcare was not compromised by the transition. We also carefully considered how to ease transportation burdens on patients. Focused reproductive healthcare outreach, a coordinated ADA-compliant transportation strategy, and several years of monitoring are among the conditions placed on this approval to safeguard healthcare access for all residents.”
OHS conditions include:
- YNHH will provide free transportation services to current primary care patients who live within 10 miles of Sargent Drive, whose trip to Sargent Drive would take them 40 minutes or more on public transit, and who do not have access to a private vehicle.
- YNHH will contract with Coordinated Transportation Solutions, Uber, and Milford Transit District to transport patients to /from the new primary care location and to/from YNHH campus locations for services. Coordinated Transportation Solutions and Milford Transit vehicles will be Americans with Disabilities Act compliant.
- Providers will coordinate medical transportation program enrollment for Medicaid patients and those with special transportation needs.
- YNHH will retain an independent consultant to recommend transportation service improvements, track transportation service program standards, and submit detailed reports on transportation options to OHS twice yearly for three years.
- YNHH will identify transportation barriers and make recommendations for improvements in a report submitted to OHS once a year for three years.
Under federal law, health centers that receive Title X funding, including the Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center and Fair Haven Community Health, are restricted from providing abortion services; must be financially and physically separate from providers who perform pregnancy termination; and may only provide non-directive counseling related to abortion for family planning.
To protect women’s access to a full complement of reproductive healthcare:
- YNHH will submit to OHS an outreach plan to provide education and information to patients related to reproductive healthcare and pregnancy termination.
- Family planning outreach and education services will continue for at least three years after the transition.
- Comprehensive reproductive healthcare including abortion services will continue to be available at the YNHH York Street offices.
In addition:
- OHS will receive reports for three years to monitor and address outstanding pharmacy, financial, and transportation complaints.
- YNHH will contribute $10,000 per year for three years to a patient assistance fund for low-income and hardship patients. Sliding scale fees and assistance to low-income patients are currently part of the community health centers’ policies and will stay in effect.
The transition of services from YNHH to the two community health centers is expected to happen in late summer of 2020 and includes shifting some primary care providers from YNHH to the centers. Cornell Scott-Hill Health and Fair Haven Community Health have a combined 26 locations and 11 school-based health centers in the region. They will continue to provide same day appointments.
Pursuant to multiple sections of the General Statutes, OHS leads the Health Systems Planning Unit that administers the Certificate of Need program—a regulatory responsibility to promote statewide health facility and service development and monitor the impact of provider acquisitions and consolidations on the communities they serve.
All documents related to this CON application can be found in the OHS CON portal under Docket # 18-32231. Click on the blue filter icon next to ‘docket number’, type 32231 in the first box, then click ‘filter’.
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Contact: Juliet Manalan
Communications Director, Connecticut Office of Health Strategy
450 Capitol Avenue
Hartford, CT 06106
860.418.7010 (office)
860.913.7528 (mobile)