Health Department Looks to Collaborate, Not Cut Positions

The city’s involvement in preliminary talks to collaborate health services with neighboring communities is not designed as a money-saving or job-cutting effort, officials said this week, stressing  that any changes or partnerships will add to or improve services already offered.

Peabody health leaders have been meeting with officials from a variety of neighboring communities- eight in all - including Salem, Lynn and Danvers as part off a state-funded effort to explore combining and collaborating community  health services.

Peabody Health Director Sharon Cameron said Monday that, while some have misunderstood the meetings as a prelude to money-saving staff consolidations, the effort is not geared toward budget trimming, rather it is focusing on making sure every department can provide top-notch services to its residents. She added that any future collaboration of services would have little to no impact on the budget in either direction.

“It isn’t a consolidation of anything, it is more like shared services,” she said. “It is to enhance the delivery of public health across the region. There is not going to be a lot of savings coming from this, that’s not what it is about.”

Peabody is one of eight area communities that was included in a $25,000 planning grant awarded by the state as part of President Barack Obama’s public health initiative. The money allows Cameron and her staff to meet with health leaders from Danvers, Salem, Lynn, Swampscott, Marblehead, Beverly and Nahant periodically over the next few months to discuss the possibility of sharing services and resources.

The discussions are merely preliminary at this point, but could lead to future collaborations among health departments in any of the included cities and towns. Efforts could focus on any variety of areas depending on each community's needs, whether it be providing more clinics and vaccinations or helping keep up with health inspections at local businesses.

“We have been looking at a lot of data to see what we can achieve better and if we see an opportunity to collaborate somewhere then the next phase would be to apply for an implementation grant,” she said.

The communities have met twice since the grant was awarded in April and plan to continue meeting until September when they must submit a formal report to the state. Once that report is submitted, cities and towns will be given the opportunity to apply for funding that could help make the collaboration ideas a reality.

Cameron said that while each community is focusing on different areas of need during the discussions, Peabody  is looking closely at ways to better educate the public on different health risks, such as high blood pressure and cholesterol or viruses like the potentially deadly H1N1 or ‘Swine Flu.’

“We are doing a good job of meeting the requirements in our restaurant inspections twice a year and responding to complaints, so I think we would like to use the opportunity to focus on improving what we do from the educational perspective,” she said. “That is really where we see the best opportunity for us in services that can help educate people on, say, cardiovascular disease, or something like that.”

While Peabody and other communities have had discussions about combining positions and departments in past years in an effort to save money during tight budget negotiations, Cameron strongly stressed that it is not the goal of this particular effort and there is no discussion of consolidation with other communities. She added that her department is funded appropriately at this time and is not struggling to meet the needs of the citizens of Peabody.

“We are fully staffed to do what we need to do and provide what we need to provide,” she said. “But we never really get to take a step back and look at what we are doing and how we can do it better. It is tough to see it from the other side. That is all the meetings are about. This is just a good opportunity to evaluate the services that we offer and to talk about how working together we can continue to improve what we are offering the community.”