Healthcare

WELL WELL WELL

In 2018, BCBSAZ launched its statewide public health initiative, Mobilize AZ, which partnered with public and private organizations to improve the health of Arizonans by tackling some of the state’s most challenging health conditions. Mobilize AZ aimed to invest in the community, increase access, build capacity, and cultivate cross-sector partnerships to inspire health.

In 2022, the launch of the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona Foundation for Community & Health Advancement formalized BCBSAZ’s commitment to the public good and took its philanthropic purpose to the next level. As a 501(c)3, this private, nonoperating Foundation works in service of Arizona’s diverse communities and the public good by providing a structure for BCBSAZ’s philanthropic efforts.

While BCBSAZ and the Foundation are separate entities, they share a commitment to inspiring health. The Foundation has already begun investing in the health of Arizona by funding programs and applied research that address Arizona’s most pressing health concerns, including: • Chronic health conditions: Identify solutions to prevent, manage, and/or treat issues like diabetes, heart disease, and cancer. • Health equity: Close disparity gaps that impact health by addressing social determinants of health such as lack of housing, transportation and access to healthy food. • Mental health: Expand statewide resources, reduce stigma and connect people to care with the goal of promoting positive mental health and saving lives. • Substance use disorder: Support prevention, harm reduction, treatment and recovery from opioid and substance use disorder to reduce overdose-related deaths. —Mike Hunter

azblue.com azbluefoundation.org

Providing both full-service emergency room and urgent care under one roof, HonorHealth has partnered with Intuitive Health to open a dual care retail model, debuting the concept for Arizona at 12,000-square-foot HonorHealth Complete Care in Surprise.

The $12-million facility offers a new healthcare experience that helps take the guesswork out of where to seek care when feeling ill or for an injury. Patients seeking care at an HonorHealth Complete Care facility are billed only for the level of services they receive rather than on the location of their care — for a savings of millions of dollars in unnecessary ER visits. Additionally, because they can access both urgent and emergency care under one roof, patients will benefit from reduced wait times — which will allow them to get the treatment they need and get them back to their lives quicker than traditional emergency room models.

“Dual emergency and urgent care facilities eliminate the need for patients to self-diagnose the severity of their health concerns before selecting the most appropriate medical center for care,” says Todd LaPorte, CEO of HonorHealth, a leading Valley healthcare system serving 1.6 million people in the greater Phoenix and Scottsdale area. “We are excited to partner with Intuitive Health to bring this concept to Arizona.”

“This location is the first in the Valley to offer this type of care, and we’re confident that this level of customer-centric service will be welcomed by this community,” says Thom Herrmann, CEO of Intuitive Health, which was founded in 2008 and pioneered the combined emergency room and urgent care model. “Our philosophy is built on a patient-centric perspective where patients are ‘wowed’ at every point in their journey.” —Mike Hunter

honorhealth.com • IHERUC.com

With her newly opened Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy private practice at the Arizona Healing Collective in Mesa, Ajona Olsen, MSN, APRN, ANP-C, addresses a medical need that currently affects the nearly 50 million adults in the U.S. and more than 2.5 million youth who are suffering from mental illnesses such as anxiety and/or depression. “Post-traumatic stress disorder has also been on the rise since the start of the pandemic. Ketamine-assisted psychotherapy in conjunction with psychotherapy works to treat mental illnesses, including anxiety, depression and PTSD, on a deeper level than anti-depressants or therapy on its own. The need for this type of medical care is enormous and has grown tremendously because of the COVID-19 pandemic,” says Olsen, who began her career in healthcare in 2001 as a registered nurse in the hospital and in 2006 became a nurse practitioner and continued working in corporate medicine.

“While ketamine has been around for a while, ketamine-assisted psychotherapy has recently developed in the medical world as healthcare professionals explore the benefits of psychedelics as an effective treatment for mental health from a safe, medical perspective,” Olsen says.

Explaining that ketamine-assisted psychotherapy is best effective at treating mental health conditions when it is working in conjunction with psychotherapy or psychiatry, Olsen says her KAP private practice will work side by side with a local therapist or psychiatrist her client may already be working with. “Ketamine and specifically ketamine-assisted psychotherapy will be used as a tool to help the client perform deeper work that would allow more rapid healing to occur.”

Olsen foresees growing into a practice model that combines medical and psychotherapy treatments at the same practice, in which the prescriber will do the medical exam and administer the ketamine medication while the therapist sits with the client during the KAP session; integration pre- and post-session with talk therapy would happen all in one practice. “I do think it would remain open, however, if a client has an established rapport with their therapist, then they would certainly use my clinic for the KAP session and follow weekly with their own therapist, which is the model I currently practice now.” —Mike Hunter

Ajona Olsen NP ajonaolsen.com