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News-Sun photo by KATARA SIMMONS At the far end of the table, Lu Xiao Hui, left, listens as members of Heartland Rural Health Network describe their specific services and methods for catching those who fall through health care's cracks.

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published: Tuesday, July 29, 2008

When it comes to health care, 'It's a small world'

By KEVIN J. SHUTT

kevin.shutt@newssun.com

SEBRING -- Listening to a director from China's Health Bureau of GuangZhou PanYu discuss rural health care issues was akin to hearing a familiar story in a new tongue.

"It's a small world," said Gyla Wise, director of Health and Family Services for Redlands Christian Migrant Association.

Wise was one of a dozen practitioners or advocates from Highlands, DeSoto and Hardee counties who attended a lunch Tuesday with Lu Xiao Hui.

Lu was 10 days into a three-week tour of United States health care networks, public and private, as part of U.S. Department of State's International Visitor Leadership Program.

Her visit here was brief.

It was preceded with stops in Gainesville and Washington. Minneapolis, Albuquerque, N.M., and Hawaii will follow.

Lu was escorted by two people -- Wei Wu, consecutive interpreter, and Max Stewart, director, International Visitor Leadership Program's Florida office.

Wu is director of Kansas State University's Chinese language program in Manhattan, Kan., and serves as an interpreter for visiting Chinese during the summer.

Stewart graduated from Sebring High School in 2000.

U.S. embassies nominate foreigners perceived as up and coming leaders.

"The purpose is to get them to see how we do things in America," Stewart said. "We're not all that different."

The International Visitor program has been around since 1962, but is one of the country's "best kept secrets," Stewart said.

Selected candidates come from all fields and have included former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai.

While here, the visitors spend time with their American counterparts to compare notes and network, Stewart explained.

In the Hibiscus Room at Inn on the Lakes, Lu introduced herself to representatives of the Heartland network of rural health service providers such as Florida Hospital Wauchula, Highlands and DeSoto county health departments, Central Florida Health Care, Pioneer Medical Center, Healthy Start, Catholic Charities and Samaritan's Health Touch Care Center.

As director of the office of rural cooperative medical system administration, Lu was tasked in 2003 to implement a pilot program for China's federal government that addressed health care reform passed in 2002.

"The goal is to increase government's share every year," Lu said, explaining health care is administered in three tiers.

There's full health care for government employed civil servants; employer provided health care with employee co-pay; and rural residents who had no benefits before 2002.

"It is required on paper but not everybody is covered yet," Lu said responding to a question about employer responsibility.

Her replies, on more than one occasion, elicited knowing chuckles and Wise's crack that problems are similar despite cultural, political and geographical differences.

Even the issue of migrant workers plagues China, where they travel between provinces.

Unlike Highlands County, where undocumented illegal migrants reportedly are mostly Mexican, Chinese migrant laborers are natives.

Nonetheless, they encounter the same challenges wrought by language barriers (they often speak different dialects), poverty (they're typically working poor) and lack of education (until recently, children of migrant workers didn't attend mainstream schools).

Lu's main focus is registering the poor in her community, who are unemployed and have never received health care benefits.

"Our problems are all the same," said Rudy Reinhardt, director, Heartland Rural Health Network.

Reinhardt orchestrated the Sebring component of Lu's visit.

"Ms. Lu thinks you are doing a good job," said Wu, after a comparison of Lu's province with Highlands County.

Here, about 97,000 residents are served by Highlands County Health Department's 108 employees, which doesn't include services provided by other governmental, quasi-governmental and non-profit agencies.

Lu's Health Bureau employs 160 people for the 2.2 million GuangZhou PanYu residents.

Lu has a staff of 30 for her rural cooperative office.

"We have similar programs, I think," Reinhardt said, acknowledging the language barrier at play.

It's not unusual, Lu explained, for doctors to treat 80 patients in an eight-hour workday.