Dear Editor:

When our community lost St. Andrews Hospital, our accessibility to patient-centered healthcare changed dramatically and not necessarily for the better. Rising health care costs and a lack of good health insurance make it literally impossible for many people in our region to get treated through Urgent Care. In the near future, when Maine Health consolidates its operations away from our peninsula, the Center will play an even more crucial role in providing healthcare to the region.

Not everyone, including our much needed summer workers, have had accessibility to affordable healthcare until the Boothbay Region Health Center opened its doors in 2018. Whether it’s a tick bite, a burn, a severe case of COVID or dealing with chronic illness, our health care center takes it on and does not turn anyone away, even if they cannot afford to pay.

The Health Care Center is essentially a gift for this community, and for the Boothbay region. And yet, it constantly struggles to find the funding it needs to keep the doors open and provide good healthcare, regardless of their financial status.

Thanks to our local “Free Bed Fund,” the Center receives reimbursement for those who are unable to pay, but receives only a small fraction of the reimbursement costs from Medicare and Medicaid. Our health care center does not limit the number of Medicaid patients many other centers do. These smaller reimbursements put an increasing financial strain on the Center and continuing to operate on the edge will eventually force one of our community’s most important assets to close its doors. The numerous fundraisers held each year are also not enough to fill in the financial gaps.

There are hundreds of success stories that can be shared as a result of people being treated at the health care center. Their staff are competent, compassionate and thorough.

One of the most valuable programs the center offers is addressing the dementia/Alzheimer’s crisis through its brain center health program and it’s the only healthcare center in the state of Maine doing so.

We desperately need to focus on keeping our health care center open and thriving. When we don’t have a reason to be treated, it’s easy to forget about this essential asset in our community, but in the times when we do, it’s there, for now.

Patricia Royall

Boothbay Region Health Center volunteer