Keeping our community healthy and saving lives requires bold initiatives. Hawaii Island’s health care providers are making those bold moves. If we hope to move the needle and improve the health of our community, all parts of our health delivery system must work together. The long-term health and wellness of our community depends on it.
Bold moves around hospital care
Hilo Benioff Medical Center is currently expanding and upgrading its Hilo facility to meet community needs. They’re also making bold moves with plans to build a 36,000-square-foot Keaau Health Center providing primary, specialty and behavioral health care. Absolutely bold, and it’ll move the needle.
The Queen’s Medical Center and Kona Community Hospital are working together to collaborate in a public/private partnership to build a new hospital in Kona. It’ll be a very expensive endeavor, costing hundreds of millions of dollars. Extremely bold and, yes, it will move the needle for West Hawaii.
Bold moves in
primary care
Primary care is your first and most efficient entry into the health care system. This is where you build a relationship with your local doctor. They know you and your family; you trust them to care for you and your loved ones. When you have a health concern you reach out to your local physician.
Early detection and treatment are vital to your overall health and to reducing the severity of chronic diseases. Your primary care provider will coordinate specialty or acute care for you. So, when you seek primary care, you’re not just protecting your own health — you’re strengthening the health of our entire community.
What does all this mean? When you wake up and you don’t feel well. You want to see your doctor sooner rather than later so you can feel better.
Sounds simple, right? Not really. Hawaii Island doesn’t just need more doctors — we need more clinics, longer hours, and care that meets people where they are. Health care must be treated as an essential service, and right now, that service is falling short. Our community deserves better, and we need to act now.
Hawaii Island Community Health Center is taking some bold steps to make this a reality — islandwide.
Our bold vision
Today, Hawaii Island Community Health Center is expanding services in Pahoa and Waikoloa by doubling our exam room capacity.
We requested $80 million in special purpose revenue bonds from the state Legislature to develop four additional health care facilities around the island. This will expand our overall capacity by 40%. This route is complicated and expensive, and we will not be using state taxpayer dollars. We are on a mission to do better, do it faster and to make primary care accessible for all.
Lives depend on it. It might be yours or someone in your family or your neighbor down the street.
A bold future
Hawaii Island Community Health Center currently serves nearly 40,000 patients a year. We are looking to add 32 new primary care exam rooms across the four new sites in Hilo, Kona, Pahoa, and Ocean View to serve an additional 12,000 to 15,000 patients. Once these projects are complete, Hawaii Island Community Health Center will operate 29 clinics around the island, including nine school-based clinics and three mobile health vans.
Hawaii Island Community Health Center is leading the change to our primary care system on Hawaii Island — delivering comprehensive, affordable and accessible care where it’s needed. We’re accelerating access and bringing care closer to home, breaking barriers so every resident gets the timely support they deserve. Bold action is transforming health care on Hawaii Island — and Hawaii Island Community Health Center along with others are driving the change.
Richard Taaffe is CEO of Hawaii Island Community Health Center. This editorial is brought to you by Community First Hawaii, a nonprofit serving as a convener and catalyst for solutions to improve health and access to health care. For more information, please visit our website at www.communityfirsthawaii.org or Facebook and Instagram pages at @communityfirsthawaii.
