Peter's Blog: Bus Tour, Day Nine

The Bay Area is home to three of the 38 stops on the Spotlight on Coverage Bus Tour. The diversity of the region’s residents is matched only by the variety of places where they can enroll: From large hospital networks to grassroots community agencies, those who live in the Alameda, Contra Costa, San Francisco, Santa Clara and San Mateo counties have many choices for in-person enrollment help.

Health care reform has made its mark in a big way at Kaiser Permanente’s Oakland Medical Center, our first bus tour stop on Friday. At this location there are currently 19,591 patients with a health plan through Covered California. These enrollees accounted for 53,350 instances of general outpatient care; 2,039 visits for treatments of broken bones and trauma; and 160 visits for maternal health care.

International Children Assistance Network (ICAN) is an agency based in Milpitas that serves the Vietnamese-American community. The United States health insurance system can be confusing to anyone who is trying to get health care, let alone immigrants encountering it for the first time. That is where ICAN steps in. Nguyen, an ICAN client, told the agency his family found Covered California enrollment confusing, but they are grateful for the affordable coverage they have now. “We appreciate ICAN staff taking the time to answer our questions, instead of rushing us out the door like other places,” said Nguyen.

The last stop of the day was KeenanDirect, a health insurance broker in San Francisco located on the Embarcadero overlooking San Francisco Bay. Insurance agents there have enrolled Bay Area residents at high levels, and we visited them to thank them for their efforts.

The Spotlight on Coverage bus is taking the weekend off, but we will be back on the road Monday visiting our partners in Northern California: