The Extra Miles Tour is our journey to visit all 100 of North Carolina’s counties. At each stop of the tour, CEO Dr. Tunde Sotunde and other Blue Cross NC leaders meet with the county’s leaders, students and educators, health care professionals and representatives of nonprofit organizations. We made our first stops at Alamance and Guilford Counties in June 2021. Check out our progress map to see where we've stopped and what we've learned so far, and watch two videos of CEO Dr. Sotunde and Fran Gary, SVP Government Markets, discussing this project.
Building Bridges Between Communities
One goal is to experience each community firsthand and establish a basis for collaborating with each community’s members in the future. Everywhere in North Carolina, people take pride in their communities and love to show us what they have built and developed. We get to see the ingenious ways that communities are tackling issues on their own, determine if and how we can help local organizations meet their goals, and build bridges between communities with similar areas of opportunity. We can also learn from the successes of grassroots organizations and replicate some of their methods to help more people across North Carolina.
Addressing Barriers to Better Health
Another goal is to learn about the obstacles each community faces to each person achieving their best health outcomes. COVID-19 has exacerbated existing challenges and made access to health care and key drivers of health even more challenging for many. more...
So far, we have seen that many areas of North Carolina have far too few primary or specialty care providers. North Carolina’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and community colleges are working on bridging the gap between skilled health care workers and community needs, and we at Blue Cross NC are developing strategies to encourage providers to continue practicing in their own communities. Another common barrier to better health outcomes is lack of broadband access, which makes it difficult for many North Carolinians to use telehealth or manage their health care online.
Short-Term and Long-Term Work
We have already begun helping our communities based on what we’ve learned on Extra Miles Tour stops. Among our many investments, one example is for the Lumbee Tribe in Robeson County. more...
The Lumbee Tribe had developed a successful peer counseling program for people affected by opioid addiction – but the program had run out of funds. Blue Cross NC dedicated $150,0001 toward establishing and funding full-time peer counselor positions for Lumbee Tribe members. As we make more tour stops, we will assess where we can provide immediate support to our communities’ work, and where we can start collaborating with community members for longer-term change.
Most health equity goals require much longer-term strategy to begin to achieve. We envision using the information we gather during the Extra Miles Tour to build statewide solutions to health care access challenges. As our 100-county tour progresses, we will continue learning, brainstorming, strategizing and building relationships with and between North Carolina's communities.
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