After hearing of work done by the SCH from 1973-76 in Southwestern Virginia, a group of concerned citizens around Meadowview formed the Washington County Health Collective (WCHC). The group wrote the SHC requesting a meeting with co-directors to discuss health care problems of the area. At this time, we learned that the four general practitioners in the area had stopped seeing those obstetrical patients who could not pay the four hundred dollars for prenatal care. If these women could not paid in full, they were denied admission to the local hospital in Abingdon. As a result of this, most women traveled forty to sixty-five miles to Bristol or Johnson City, Tenn. for their prenatal care and labor and delivery. Due to these circumstances, some women could not get adequate prenatal care, while those who did risked the chance of not making it to the hospital in time to deliver. The community concern over this problem generated a great deal of interest in alternative health care models. The WCHC asked our assistance in helping to organize the local citizens–around this issue in particular and around primary care in general.
