Equality Health

10/16/2026

A member in Arizona had his first appointment with a new behavioral health provider coming up, and he needed two things to get there: a ride, and someone who could advocate for him once he arrived.

One of our community health workers arranged the ride, and then went to the appointment as well, meeting him there and staying with him through the intake for moral support.

We also helped him schedule his follow-up appointments and will arrange rides to each of them.

A first behavioral health appointment can be a hard one to walk into, and the visits that follow matter just as much as the first. Sometimes the most helpful thing a care team can offer is simply to be there.

As October turns our attention to mental health, we are grateful to the colleague who met him there, and to every community health worker who helps someone take that first step, and the ones after it.

10/01/2026

In April 2024, the recommended age to begin routine mammograms moved from 50 to 40, which brought a full decade of women into the conversation.

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force now recommends a mammogram every other year from 40 through 74 for women at average risk. Its reasons included rising rates among women in their 40s and a gap in outcomes that deserves our attention, because Black women are about 40% more likely to die of breast cancer than white women.

We are proud to support women's health each and every day!

09/21/2026

Three things World Alzheimer's Day is for:

1. Awareness -- dementia is a disease, not a normal part of getting older. Treating it as inevitable is one reason people go years without a diagnosis.

2. Challenging stigma -- often the reason families go quiet. A diagnosis can cost someone their social life long before it affects their memory, because the people around them stop knowing what to say.

3. Support for everyone affected -- first and foremost the person living with dementia, and the families carrying it alongside them.

Stigma is the part all of us can help change. How a diagnosis is delivered, and whether someone is still spoken to rather than about, can shape what the next few years look like.

Say the word out loud. Keep inviting them.

09/15/2026

Someone marks a year this month. They will probably not post about it.

National Recovery Month has run every September since 1989, and its message has not changed: treatment works, and people recover. What changes, slowly, is how many of us are willing to say so out loud.

Recovery is rarely one decision. It is a long run of ordinary ones -- a call returned, a door left open, somebody who did not write a person off.

The language does real work here. "Person in recovery," not "addict." "Substance use disorder," not "abuse." Those words decide whether someone feels like a patient or a problem, and that shapes whether they come back at all.

This month is a good time to say the quiet part plainly: people get better.

09/09/2026

What stops us from asking someone directly?

September is National Su***de Prevention Month, and the most stubborn myth it exists to challenge is that asking about su***de plants the idea. It does not. Asking plainly, without flinching, is one of the few things that reliably opens a door -- and it is the part most of us avoid, because we are afraid of getting it wrong.

You do not need the right words. You need to be willing to stay in the conversation, and to know where to point.

If you or someone you know is struggling, the 988 Su***de and Crisis Lifeline is available by call or text, 24 hours a day.

Awareness is not a ribbon. It is one more person willing to ask.

***dePreventionMonth

09/04/2026

118 days. That is what is left of the measurement year, and every gap still open on December 31 is a patient who did not get care they were due.

Five measures are carrying the year-end push across the network: well-child visits, childhood immunizations, well-woman care, glycemic status and blood pressure control.

With a smart worklist built from CareEmpower, they are all are more winnable than they look. CBP scores the most recent documented reading, so a controlled reading taken in December replaces an uncontrolled one from October — a member who looked open all year can close on a single visit. And glycemic status is not one measure, but two; GSD8 and GSD9 point in opposite directions, and which one you are scored on depends on your market.

Check out our library of blogs on what we have published for those five, now all on one page for quick access. Your roadmap is ready, and we're here to help make it simple.

09/03/2026

Curiosity is one of the most useful questions you can ask an older patient.

For Healthy Aging Month, the 2026 theme is Curiosity Has No Age Limit. Learning something new, trying a new activity, or exploring a new place can say a lot about a person's cognition, mood, mobility, and social connection.

Sometimes, "What have you been curious about lately?" opens a more meaningful conversation than, "Any changes since last time?"

08/25/2026

A mother called about food and money. She finished the call with her child's well-child visit on the calendar.

Those are not separate problems, though most systems treat them that way. When a family is choosing between the utility bill and groceries, a preventive appointment is not the thing that gets scheduled. It is the thing that gets postponed until something goes wrong.

One of our Community Health Workers worked all of it in one conversation. She found community organizations that could help, arranged therapy referrals for the child's behavioral health concerns, and connected the family to food pantries and utility assistance. Then she asked about the open care gaps and coordinated directly with the practice to get the well-child visit and immunizations scheduled.

That is what our Community Health Workers do. They meet families where the barriers actually are, and they do not hand back a phone number and call it a referral.

08/24/2026

A member in Texas had stopped showing up for her primary care appointments. It was not transportation, and it was not cost.

Cancer ran in her family. She had lost relatives to it. Already managing several chronic conditions, she told our community health worker she was afraid of what one more visit might add to the list -- so she stopped going.

Our CHW did not lead with the appointment. The CHW listened first, then talked through what staying ahead of her health could look like instead of what it might cost her to find out. By the end of the conversation the member was ready, and Angelique got her scheduled with her primary care provider.

The CHWs reflection afterward is the part worth sitting with: the barriers we cannot see -- fear, depression, loneliness -- shape whether someone gets care as much as the ones we can measure. Connecting a member to a ride is part of the job. Sometimes the job is helping someone move from fear to hope.

08/13/2026