Making sure people who apply for Commonwealth Care are able to get and keep their coverage was on the minds of outreach workers at the Western Massachusetts HAN meeting in April, which featured a presentation by the Director of Commonwealth Care, Melissa Boudreault.
Outreach workers do the hard work of explaining policy changes to real people, so often they are among the first to hear feedback about how they are working. Not surprisingly, this was a theme of the Western Mass. Health Access Network meeting this February, when we gathered with outreach and enrollment workers from Berkshire, Franklin, Hampshire and Hampden counties. HAN members doing enrollment agreed that there is still confusion and frustration in their communities.
December was intense... this is the 'take-away' from our Health Access Network meetings in Amherst and Boston this month. Across the board, people providing enrollment assistance in hospitals, community health centers and community organizations were faced with a huge number of people trying to get health insurance coverage before the Dec. 31 deadline. John Bergeron from Hilltowns Community Health Center got the prize for the latest request for assistance; he received several phone messages on the evening of December 31 from people looking to comply with the mandate.
