ANDERSON — Two central Indiana health care providers that currently only have a small foothold in Madison County want to significantly expand their services here.
Headquartered in Indianapolis, the Jane Pauley Community Health Center provides pediatric care to patients in partnership with Community Hospital Anderson.
Open Door Health Services, which is headquartered in Muncie, has two offices here that provide family planning and WIC, or Women, Infant and Children's services, to Madison County residents.
Both nonprofit groups want to expand their services for uninsured and underinsured county residents, a plan that would put them in direct competition with the Madison County Community Health Centers.
Joined by Aspire Indiana, all three groups made presentations Wednesday to groups that support or make referrals to health care providers, such as county school systems and social service organizations. The meeting was organized by the United Way of Madison County.
Michael Dale, finance director for the Jane Pauley health centers, said there's a lot of unmet need for health care in the county. He said U.S. Census data show there are 41,000 low-income people living in the county, of which only 9,800 report receiving care from providers.
Toni Estep, chief executive officer of Open Door, said expanding services has been part of the organization's strategic plan since 2012.
Mike Casuscelli, of the Communty Health Center, said that group has been the principal health care provider for low-income and uninsured county residents since 1999, and has established partnerships with many of the organizations at the stakeholder meeting.
However, all the groups said they are committed to building strong local partnerships even in areas where they might compete.