California has a long history of statewide and regional clinic consortia serving a wide array of safety-net clinics, collectively referred to as community clinics and health centers (CCHCs). These clinic consortia have made important contributions to the success of CCHCs over the last 20 years.

This report seeks to portray and highlight a comprehensive landscape: who the statewide and regional consortia are; their members, leadership, and staffing; and how their services are delivered and financed. The report documents how consortia work to advance access to health center services, ensure high-quality performance, and offer operational support to their members and communities. It describes select changes and evolution over time and concludes by recommending a series of strategic opportunities to further strengthen consortia impact.

Key findings in the paper — Forces for Change: A Landscape of the Statewide and Regional Clinic Consortia in California — include:

• As of 2018, there are five statewide clinic consortia and 13 regional consortia that together represent 233 CCHCs operating over 1,300 sites across the state. Consortia represent the vast majority of CCHCs and range in size from 3 to 177 health center members. Almost half of their members have been associated with a consortium for over 20 years. Collectively, the CCHCs belonging to consortia provide care to over 6.5 million patients.
• The primary areas of activity across statewide and regional consortia include policy and advocacy, access to care, delivery system transformation, data-sharing, quality improvement, and social determinants of health.
• There are strategic opportunities for statewide and regional consortia to provide additional value-added services to their members in areas that include safety-net collaboration and partnerships; value-based care, including clinical quality and managed care; and workforce development initiatives. Additional dialogue, targeted funding, and planning support would help to more fully examine the potential and risks of consortia expanding into these areas.

Read the full report, available for download under Related Materials, for more details. CHCF supported the Pacific Health Consulting Group in its creation of this report.