HHS Marks Expansion of 1200th Health Center, Meeting Key...(f 10 have incomes below 200 percent of t...),Health

The range of services offered at health centers has increased along with the number of patients served. In 2006, almost 2.6 million patients received dental services, an increase of more than 80 percent over the 1.4 million dental patients served in 2001. Gains were even more striking among patients who received mental health services. In 2006, 470,000 patients came to health centers for mental health care, an increase of almost 170 percent over the 176,000 patients who received such care in 2001.

HHS' success in implementing the President's initiative led to another Presidential initiative, first announced in 2005, to extend the benefits of health centers to the poorest counties of the country. The High Poverty Counties Initiative achieved major success in 2007 when HHS announced the first set of nearly $40 million in grants awarded to 80 new health center sites. These grants will help an estimated 300,000 residents in these areas gain access to health center services.

"With these two initiatives, we have been able to focus on not only increasing access to care at new sites but we also increased the quality of care and added new services like oral and mental health," said HRSA Administrator Elizabeth Duke.

The health center program's annual budget has grown from $1.16 billion in fiscal year 2001 to $1.99 billion in fiscal year 2007.

Additional information on HHS-funded health centers is available at: http://bphc.hrsa.gov/ and http://bphc.hrsa.gov/presidentsinitiative/

Note: All HHS press releases, fact sheets and other press materials are available at http://www.hhs.gov/news.