(FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE) Williamsport – The River Valley Health and Dental Center welcomed Cheri Rinehart, President and CEO of the Pennsylvania Association of Community Health Centers (PACHC), who spoke at a meeting of their staff today in the Garden Terrace Room at the Genetti Hotel.
Cheri Rinehart provides strategic direction to PACHC in representing the more than 300 federally qualified health center (FQHC), RHC and like mission provider sites across the commonwealth and the more than 800,000 people who count on them for care. Prior to joining PACHC, she served as vice president of The Hospital & Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania. She is an RN and licensed NHA. She was one of 20 nurses selected nationwide annually as an RWJ Executive Nurse Fellow, is a graduate of the RULE Leadership Program at Penn State and is a summa cum laude graduate of Bloomsburg University. Cheri serves on the boards of the National Association of Community Health Centers, Central Penn College and the American Trauma Society, and on the national FQHC advisory boards of UnitedHealthcare and AmeriHealth Caritas. A long-standing organ and tissue donation advocate, she is a gubernatorial appointee on the PA Organ Donation Advisory Committee, which she chaired for two terms. She is a recipient of the PA Rural Health Leader of the Year award, the American College of Emergency Physicians Outstanding Contribution to Emergency Medicine award, and other recognitions.
Rinehart will speak on the impact of community health centers, currently and in the future. Her unique perspective provided an upbeat message to those in attendance as to the role of Community Health Centers, such as the River Valley Health and Dental Center, plays in the delivery of primary care to communities such as Williamsport. In addition, she is to share important future trends in the delivery of healthcare services facing such Centers. Rinehart also had the opportunity to speak to the Center’s Board of Directors in a special, private session later that same day.
“My goal was to convey to the staff and leadership of the River Valley Health and Dental Center not only their importance to the health and wellness of the greater Williamsport community, but also the important role they play as part of the state’s and nation’s “community of Community Health Centers,” as well as to offer some insights on changes, challenges and opportunities on the horizon.”
Rinehart continues, “Community Health Centers like River Valley are a vital link to access to quality, affordable medical, dental and mental health care for the residents of the communities they serve.
In addition, health centers are an important bridge over the partisan divide and the division we see in our communities and across our nation. We get that community means everyone and that everyone has an obligation to do their part to make their community better. We get that by working together we are all stronger.”
The River Valley Health and Dental Center is a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC), a non-profit community-based health organization independently governed by a community board of directors and located in the Hepburn Plaza (471 Hepburn Street) in the center of Williamsport. It serves the residents of the greater river valley community with comprehensive primary care – medical and dental including chiropractic, behavioral health, reproductive health, and pediatric dental services. Not only does the Center provide services to the medically underserved to prevent illness and foster wellness, but to everyone in our river valley community, and provides care that goes beyond the conventional to address needs and other factors that may cause sickness, proactively managing chronic conditions for improved and sustainable outcomes and overcoming common barriers to care.
