Addressing Healthcare Disparities In the Communities We Serve

By Deneen Richmond, President of Luminis Health Doctors Community Medical Center

Everyone deserves high-quality healthcare and healthy communities. That’s why healthcare equity is a top priority at Luminis Health, a non-profit health system in Maryland. As we strive to become a national model for Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI), Luminis Health is committed to addressing long-standing health disparities that have particularly impacted Black communities and other communities of color. I am passionate about our JEDI focus because of my own experiences as a young child forced into court-ordered busing to integrate schools in 1972. As the president of a hospital less than a mile from the elementary school where I first experienced racism, I am in a unique position to address these important issues.

We must first recognize that racial disparities exist throughout healthcare. Through the work and dedication of our CEO Tori Bayless and the Health Equity and Anti-Racism Task (HEART) Force, Luminis Health is guided by 10 strategic priorities to confront racism, address the impacts of systemic inequity and dismantle structural injustice. Our teams have instituted interventions to reduce C-sections overall, especially among Black women. Members of our obstetric services have completed training on implicit bias recognition and mitigation. We have run mobile health screenings for patients with diabetes and high blood pressure, provided COVID-19 education and outreach, and supported multiple staterun and community COVID-19 testing and vaccine sites. Luminis Health led the way by administering more than 125,000 COVID-19 vaccines in our communities.

When Luminis Health was formed, we made a commitment to increas e high-quality, accessible, safe healthcare in Prince George’s County, an area outside of Washington, D.C. with nearly one million residents. Since 2019, we have invested $84 million at Luminis

Health Doctors Community Medical Center (LHDCMC) in Lanham, including recently opening a new Behavioral Health Pavilion to provide inpatient mental health services, and outpatient mental health and substance use services, something desperately needed in our community and nationwide. This new center will have an inpatient psychiatric unit, and other services such as walk-in urgent care, a mental health clinic, and psychiatric day programs. This center is another example of our commitment to our community by offering residents expanded access to high-quality treatment, rehabilitation and support services.

I am proud to embark on a new journey to expand women’s and children’s healthcare services in Prince George’s County. It is unacceptable that 8 out of 10 women have to deliver their baby outside of the County because of a lack of obstetrical and other healthcare services. For me, this is personal because it would have been nice to deliver my two sons in Prince George’s County, the place I grew up and honored to still call home today.

One of the bold goals of Vision 2030, our 10-year strategic plan, is to eliminate maternal and infant mortality. It’s a deep concern because the maternal mortality rate for Black women in Prince George’s County is 50 percent higher than the national average. To address this life and death issue, we are now raising $300 million to renovate and upgrade LHDCMC. A major component of the long-term project is to build a Women’s Health Center for inpatient obstetrics services, labor and delivery, and postpartum care. We’re already addressing some of these unmet needs by offering free mammograms and a variety of minimallyinvasive treatments, including Fibroids and gynecologic cancers. The health system has also expanded surgical services to include general abdominal, bariatric and bladder surgeries. Once Luminis Health receives state approval for the proposed women’s tower, we’re ready to begin construction on our campus, which will take three to five years to complete.

We expect to add more than 100 fulltime employees for the new women’s health center, including doctors, nurses, technicians, social workers and support staff. We are committed to having a workforce that is reflective of our community. Approximately 70 percent of our employees live within Prince George’s County and our goal is to hire even more from the County. To enhance our already racially diverse staff, we’ve increased recr uiting nursing students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, partnering with area high schools and community colleges to offer internship opportunities for student s that may lead to future employment, as well as finding opportunities to hire people with intellectual and other developmental disabilities.

Healthcare workers have been on the front lines battling COVID for more than three years. Many hospitals in the United States have struggled with staffing shortages and longer wait-times, especially in Emergency Departments. To help attract and retain a highly-qualified workforce, Luminis Health implemented $29M in employee incentives during the pandemic, including raising our minimum wage to $17/hour and offering health benefits to part-time workers at full-time rates. We are also providing resources, activities and education to help enhance an employee’s wellbeing. Luminis Health has increased mental and emotional health offerings and created Exhale Rooms where teams can step off of the floor to decompress. We also use exhale carts to offer rel axation to employees who can’t step away.

LHDCMC has been a beacon of hope for this community for nearly 50 years. With the support of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, state and local leaders, our team members and you, we can collectively address health inequi ties, improve health outcomes for all and make meaningful change within our organization and the communities we serve. Our commitment is unwavering and could very well be a blue print for health systems across the country because we all want a brighter, healthier future for the places we call home with healthcare close to home.

Deneen Richmond, MHA, RN serves as the President of Luminis Health Doctors Community Medical Center