NeoMed Center pumps $5.5M to expand facilities
NeoMed center’s executives gather for the recent announcement.
NeoMed Center, a nonprofit corporation that operates several 330 primary health centers, is expanding its facilities in Gurabo through an investment of $4.9 million from federal funds. The company will also develop a new community medicine facility in Aguas Buenas at a cost of $650,000, also stemming from the U.S. government’s Public Health Service Act.
The Gurabo project includes the renovation of the current NeoMed Center facility and construction of a new two-story building that will house medical offices and other facilities to serve patients without health insurance or with limited insurance coverage.
Construction should begin next year and both facilities should be fully operational by 2015, said Rosa Castro, executive director of NeoMed Center.
Recently, the NeoMed Center clinic in Gurabo became the first 330 center in Puerto Rico to achieve accreditation from the National Committee for Quality Assurance as a provider under the Patient Center Medical Home model, a patient-centered service, through a process that included the implementation of electronic medical record and the expansion of a multidisciplinary treatment model that incorporates psychologists and health educators to achieve greater involvement of patients in their own treatment.
“We have always offered patient-centered services, but now with this NCQA certification, we’ve managed to improve our processes and standardize them, meeting goals set by federal government for this type of facility, which is expected to eventually improve health care costs through better quality health services because patients will be well cared for and monitored,” said Castro.
Services patients receive at NeoMed Center include: family medicine, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, cardiology, minor surgery, internist, immunization, laboratory, nutritionist, home visits, X-rays and ultrasound, dental clinic and comprehensive HIV services to individuals and families, among others.
