Reaching Out, Making Health Happen Together
WellSpan Health remains steadfast in our mission of Working as One to improve health through exceptional care for all, lifelong wellness and healthy communities.
The community component of this mission remains top of mind as we work as one to deliver convenient and easily accessible services in our traditional healthcare settings, as well as out into our communities when and where our care is needed and wanted. With the help and collaboration of our community partners, the achievements made in fiscal year 2023 truly embody the spirit of Reaching Out, Making Health Happen Together. Creating healthy communities expands beyond simply offering healthcare; it requires actively listening to community members to better understand, identify and remove barriers to care, providing the tools and resources to encourage healthy lifestyles and connecting individuals to needed services and social support. WellSpan cannot do this work alone. We continually engage with other organizations who share our mission to identify and create opportunities to expand our reach, help more people and collectively improve the health and well-being of the communities we serve.
The successes highlighted below represent a small fraction of the brightest achievements shared in our 2023 Community Benefit Report.
- Promoted the importance of self-care and mental well-being in various ways, including $182,000 in grants to community partners for programs geared toward adolescent mental well-being and peer support, delivery of mental health education programs, integration of mental well-being messages and support in existing community health activities, and collaboration with community through county health coalition-led messaging through social media and outreach initiatives.
- Enhanced access to behavioral healthcare through the $4 million grant-funded START program, embedded WellSpan crisis co-responders in 11 police departments, and grew the Foundations Pregnancy Support Services, where 360 new mothers with a history of addiction receive the extra health and social service support they need to keep themselves and their newborns healthy.
- Deployed 353 My Interpretation Assistant (MIA)s across our ambulatory and hospital sites to provide expert, on-demand interpretation assistance to patients in over 270 languages.
- Incorporated the voice of the community in the design and delivery of care by establishing an 18-member Community Advisory Group and holding community listening sessions for healthcare access on general topics and hypertension. Insights provided by the community will be incorporated into patient care approaches.
- Completed comprehensive Plain Community Health Needs Assessment to identify actionable steps WellSpan can take to improve patient care of this special population.
- Successfully onboarded and engaged 145 internal Inclusion Champions to inform, prepare and support frontline staff to solve problems and initiate changes as we continue to embark on our DEI journey.
- Launched Heretohelpall.org, powered by FindHelp, a community based referral platform. All WellSpan providers and community members can search for and connect with community organizations or resources. Since the launch in January 2023, 3,000 users logged into Heretohelpall.org, accounting for 1,889 connections with community-based programs.
- Invested $100,000 in partners dedicated to creating stable housing for residents across our region by caring for unsheltered, repairing and modifying homes for low-income seniors, and engaging stakeholders in a data-driven collective action initiative designed for systems-level change.
- Tackled hunger by initiating a program where all food-insecure patients can receive a shelf stable food package and provided care navigation to community-based resources. Supported two major multi-year projects where community partners launched an online choice food pantry targeted at rural communities, increased food assistance program enrollment and retention through a mobile WIC unit, converted a mass distribution food pantry to choose pantry model, and engaged 12 families in a self-sufficiency educational program.
- Engaged 10,000 children and family members across six counties in Get Outdoors Program, a partnership with the county library and parks.
We invite you to learn more about our efforts and achievements through the stories included in our 2023 Community Benefit Report that illustrate the inspiring outcomes of our year of Reaching Out, Making Health Happen Together.
Download the 2023 Community Benefit Executive Summary
In This Report
WellSpan by the Numbers - 2023
59,870
hospital inpatients
273,536
emergency department visits
2,500,208
primary/specialty care visits
1,008,012
imaging studies
315,266
telehealth visits
$1.5 million
community grants
179,305
home health visits
25,000
participants in health programs
About WellSpan
Who We Serve
WellSpan Health is much more than an integrated healthcare system. We are dedicated to understanding and addressing the needs of each community we serve. With approximately 20,000 employees, WellSpan has more than 220 patient care locations and eight respected hospitals, plus a regional behavioral health organization and a regional home care organization.
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Our Leaders
