PORTLAND, Ore. - Medical Teams International (Medical Teams), a nonprofit, humanitarian aid organization based in the Northwest, and Cambia Health Solutions, a national total health solutions company based in Portland, announced their local and global work together will continue, with Medical Teams named a Cambia Community Partner Organization for the second consecutive year.
Cambia works with a few select nonprofits each year as Community Partner Organizations. In addition to providing funding, Cambia collaborates with each nonprofit to make mutual, ongoing investments of employees’ time and talent to change and improve health care and communities.
“As a values-driven company focused on continuous innovation, Cambia is proud to partner with Medical Teams International,” said Mark Ganz, President and CEO of Cambia Health Solutions. “The organization has a profound impact on improving the health of our communities – both locally and globally – and the impact they’re making is both tangible and far-reaching.”
“We strongly believe that the best way to make sustainable, positive change in the world is through strategic and creative partnerships like ours with Cambia,” said Medical Teams interim director Jon Beighle. “The results can be profound when experts from disparate backgrounds come together in support of one goal.”
This partnership continues two efforts. First, Cambia’s regional support of Medical Teams’ mobile dental clinics, delivering free dental care through the largest program of its kind in the country. Last year, Medical Teams provided dental services to more than 25,000 economically disadvantaged adults and children in Oregon and Washington, thanks to the support of Cambia and other partners; this year, Cambia will fund 16 clinics in Oregon and Washington.
The Cambia-Medical Teams partnership is also centered on the creation of a unique health app to be used in refugee settings that will enable a more efficient response to complex health emergency situations. To build the Android-based software, a team of IT professionals from Cambia traveled to Uganda with Medical Teams hosts to assess firsthand the needs of the health care professionals serving more than 350,000 refugees living in the various settlements in Uganda, with a focus on the Nakivale settlement in southwestern Uganda.
From this unique vantage point, the Cambia team identified the problem – the exhaustive quantity of paper forms used to track patients and diseases – and developed a beta app designed to streamline the process. The team will collaborate on a test pilot this summer, with an eye on possible deployment at the remaining seven clinics in the settlement later in 2016.
