Mercy Care and Touchstone Health dispatching mobile vaccination teams to Gompers COVID-19 vaccine clinics serving individuals with developmental and intellectual disabilities

Contacts:

Monica Alonzo
Marketing and Communications Manager, Mercy Care

alonzom@mercycareaz.org or 602-370-4275

Mark Botterbusch
Vice President of Operations, Gompers

mbotterbusch@gompers.org or 602-336-0061, ext. 155

 

PHOENIX, Ariz. (March 31, 2021) – Clients and staff members at Gompers, a nonprofit agency that supports adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities with a private school, day programs and an employment program, are getting a visit from a mobile COVID-19 vaccination team in April. 

• April 7 at 9 a.m. at the Employment Services Campus, 5340 W. Bethany Home Rd., in Glendale*
• April 7 at 11 a.m. at the Phoenix Campus, 6601 N. 27th Ave., in Phoenix*
• April 9 at 9 a.m. at the Blythe Center Campus, 7565 W. Peoria Ave., Ste. A, in Peoria*

 

These efforts are part of a broader initiative by AHCCCS, the Arizona Department of Economic Security’s Division of Developments Disabilities (DDD), and Mercy Care to proactively reach out to providers in the community that serve individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and seniors with complex health care needs, to ensure that vulnerable populations who need – and want – the vaccine are able to get it. 

 

Mercy Care has leveraged its positive relationships and deep knowledge of the Arizona provider community to organize group vaccination events at day programs, in centralized areas of group homes and apartment communities and directly in someone’s home, if needed. 

 

Mercy Care, which provides integrated health care to individuals with IDD under a state contract with DDD, connected Gompers and Touchstone Health Services. Touchstone Health Services is providing the mobile team and supplies. The Maricopa County Department of Public Health is providing the vaccines.

 

“People with developmental disabilities have a lot of other complicating factors, which puts them at a high risk with COVID,” said Mark Botterbusch, Gompers vice president of operations. “Our families and members are so grateful that Touchstone Health Services and Mercy Care are bringing these vaccinations to them.”

 

Participants receiving the COVID-19 vaccination at all Gompers locations will be available for interviews. Spanish-speaking families and staff are available for interviews at the Blythe Center Campus in Peoria. 

 

“We’re pleased to be taking care of vulnerable individuals in our state,” said April Rhodes, CEO of Spectrum Healthcare Group & Touchstone Health Services. “We want everyone who wants a vaccine to have that opportunity. Partnering with Mercy Care to mobilize to programs such as Gompers is furthering that effort. Mobilizing our Anywhere Healthcare team to administer COVID vaccine is our way of ensuring equitable access for all members of our state.”

 

Lorry Bottrill, CEO of Mercy Care, said, “We saw a need to remove barriers for our most vulnerable Arizonans who want to get the vaccine. Scheduling and transportation can be challenging for people with special health care needs. That’s why it’s important that we leverage our community partnerships to get vaccines to individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.”

 

*These mobile vaccination clinics are not open to the public.

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About Gompers

Since 1947 Gompers has served the needs of the intellectually and developmentally challenged community in the Phoenix metropolitan area.  Through its belief of ‘Enhancing Abilities while Seeing Possibilities’ the organization recognizes that each person each day brings a unique set of abilities, skill sets and amazing potential through our program doors of day treatment, employment services, in-home care and our Gompers private school.  Gompers staff is dedicated to helping those we serve reach their fullest potential.  For more information about Gompers, please visit www.Gompers.org.

 

About Touchstone Health Services/Spectrum Healthcare Group 

Spectrum was the first organization in Northern Arizona to offer structurally integrated healthcare. Founded in 1965 as a small behavioral healthcare clinic in Cottonwood, AZ, Spectrum now provides whole health services state-wide utilizing traditional, mobile and virtual delivery models. For more information, visit www.spectrumhealthcare-group.org. Touchstone Health Services is headquartered in Phoenix AZ. Touchstone focuses on community and school-based services for children from birth to 18. For more information, visit www.touchstonehs.org. 

 

About Mercy Care 

Mercy Care is a not-for-profit Medicaid managed-care health plan, serving AHCCCS members in Arizona since 1985. Mercy Care is a local company sponsored by Dignity Health and Ascension Health. Mercy Care provides access to physical and behavioral health care services for Medicaid-eligible families, children, seniors, and individuals with developmental/cognitive disabilities. Learn more at www.MercyCareAZ.org.