The 2017 Leaders in Health Care Awards: Achievement in Community Outreach

Quality and respect. These are the words Pacific Medical Centers (PacMed) employees live and work by. The group is a private, not-for-profit, primary and integrated multispecialty health care network with 11 outpatient clinics across the Puget Sound region and more than 150 primary and specialty care providers. Affiliated with the Providence Health & Services system, PacMed provides patient-focused health care and even same-day appointments to nearly 100,000 patients in King, Snohomish and Pierce counties. Its philosophy is to empower patients to participate in their care and focus on wellness, prevention and proactive management of chronic conditions. PacMeds approach reflects its history as the first U.S. Public Health Service Hospital in Seattle. Throughout its history, PacMed has served diverse patient populations within the community, including the underserved, multiple ethnic groups, military families and commercially insured patients. PacMed is one of only six providers in the nation and the only provider on the West Coast to bring the U.S. Family Health Plan (USFHP) program to active-duty family members and retired personnel. As a result, some patients have been with PacMed and the program for 15 to 20 years and have developed strong partnerships with their physicians. Its also a cofounding member of Project Access Northwest, which encourages specialty physicians to provide care at no cost to low-income, uninsured individuals.