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Healthier Communities

We're Focusing on Health Care Issues at the Local Level

By listening to and partnering with local organizations on the issues they face, we’re supporting the health of all our communities and the people who are proud to call them home.

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Healthier Communities

There are 100 counties spread across North Carolina, with needs as varied as the people who live there.

Blue Cross NC is taking a localized approach to community health by listening to and working side-by-side with organizations already on the ground helping to improve everything from Black maternal health, to housing, to professional skills training. These investments in our local communities provide the support, access and opportunity for good health to grow and spread across the state, lowering the cost of health care for all.

What are drivers of health, and how do they impact the price you pay for health care?

To make health care affordable for everyone, we have to support health at the community level and address disparities in housing, food security, and transportation that drive up costs.

Learn more about drivers of health

Drivers of Health

Health care isn’t always about treating symptoms and conditions. Many aspects of our lives impact our health and the health of others: the food we eat, where we live, our childhood experiences and how we earn income. Keeping health care affordable for everyone requires both understanding and addressing non-medical drivers of health that can have long-term impacts on the cost of care.

Devin Lyall

Drivers of Health

Paving the road to recovery from addiction in rural NC

Devin Lyall was a talented dancer who suffered from opioid addiction and lost everything. Hear how she’s using her experience with addiction and recovery to bring support, education, and compassion to mental health care in her Wilkes County community.

Vichi Jagannathan speaking to 2 African American men

Drivers of Health

Rural communities face higher rates of childhood trauma. One woman is using Stanford methodology to help them heal.

Unresolved childhood trauma can impact everything from mental health to education to career opportunities. We are partnering with organizations in rural communities that teach people how to break the cycle of trauma.

A middle aged African American man stands outside and shakes hands joyously with an older Caucasian man with vitiligo and a long white beard. A middle aged African American woman stands in the background smiling and wearing a blue cardigan.

Drivers of Health

What are drivers of health, and how do they impact the price you pay for health care?

Keeping our communities healthy is a big step in making health care affordable for everyone. With partnerships across North Carolina, we’re addressing the social, economic and environmental factors that burden our health care system and drive up costs.

Cassie Ward walking into Maternity Home with a bag full of groceries.

Drivers of Health

From homeless and pregnant to helping others: A woman’s inspiring journey

Cassie is helping young women and pregnant teens experiencing homelessness become self-sufficient. Hear how her experience as a young mother is leading others to find stability before and after childbirth. 

Two women, one with short brown hair in a purple shirt and jean shorts and the other a young African American woman in a bright yellow shirt, blue gloves on her hands, and a mask, stand behind the trunk of a parked car and lift cardboard boxes out of it.

Drivers of Health

Food Security Impacts Health and Well-Being

Food affects our health in so many ways—from malnutrition to chronic illness and much more. That’s why we’re working with organizations across the state to make sure families have food on the table.

Learn more at blog.bcbsnc.com

Strengthen NC

At Blue Cross NC, we know that when we invest in those whose need is greatest, we improve health care for everyone. Through our Strengthen NC initiative, we’re providing support to organizations that are led by or serve communities of color. Our goal is to help these organizations grow and fulfill their mission in improving health equity, today and tomorrow.

A multiracial family sits together laughing in a park surrounding a young girl in the middle who yells with joy.

Strengthen NC

Strengthen NC

Through our Strengthen NC initiative, we’re helping organizations led by or serving historically under-resourced communities and people of color who are making a positive impact in their health and wellbeing.

Learn more at www.bluecrossnc.com

Maya Jackson, pregnant, smiles holding a tolder in the air

Strengthen NC

Maya Jackson is bringing holistic care to mothers of color. And it may just save their lives.

Meet Maya Jackson of MAAME, whose work is empowering Black, indigenous and other pregnant people of color to navigate health systems and access holistic maternal health and wellness services.

Strengthen NC

Care for NC’s migrant farmworkers is care for NC

There’s strength in partnering with organizations helping migrant and seasonal farmworkers in Western NC connect to bilingual, affordable, and accessible health care.

Learn more at blog.bcbsnc.com

Health Care Equity

Eliminating disparities based on race, gender identity, sexual orientation, geographical location and economic status is how “health for all” happens. Through investments and strategic partnerships across the state, we are actively addressing issues like poor maternal health outcomes for people of color, chronic illness for Native Americans and Hispanic migrant workers, access to behavioral health services for youth living in rural areas, and much more.

A person has their hands clasped in their lap over a red journal while a young girl sits blurred out in the background attending a therapy session.

Health Care Equity

Addressing Disparities in Behavioral Health

To improve the health and wellbeing of all North Carolinians, we have to address disparities in mental health care. Here’s what we’re doing to integrate mental health services across the health care system.

Learn more at blog.bcbsnc.com

Darlene Graham

Health Care Equity

Preserving the Health of the Tribe

We’re working with tribal members like Darlene to address food insecurity and chronic illness through native crops. See how she’s connecting food security and nutrition to her heritage.

A poster of Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina is centered in front of green tent. People wearing green clothes and hats stand in the background. It reads "Fearless is investing in North Carolina's health".

Health Care Equity

Blue Cross NC Invests in 17 Organizations to Address Health Equity

As part of our ongoing effort to eliminate racial, health and geographical disparities, we’ve awarded funding to organizations in NC who are actively improving maternal, infant and behavioral health outcomes, and serving historically underrepresented communities and people of color.

Learn more at mediacenter.bcbsnc.com

Telehealth

It’s not always necessary to make the trip to a doctor’s office—and it’s not always possible. We’re working to expand telehealth coverage across the state—and contribute to the infrastructure supporting it—so that factors like access to transportation, geographic location, physical mobility or public safety protocols don’t interfere with access to care.

A woman with headphones on speaks to her doctor over the computer. Buttons to end the call and go on mute are aligned across the bottom of the screen. The doctor in the screen is wearing blue scrubs and a stethoscope.

Telehealth

Doctors Explain the Benefits of Telehealth

Wondering how—and why—telehealth works? Hear from two physicians about the benefits of virtual care and how to navigate a telehealth appointment.

Learn more at blog.bcbsnc.com

Two young African American women and an older Caucasian man stand smiling holding a large check from Blue Cross Blue Shield made out to Elizabeth City University in North Carolina.

Telehealth

Telepsychiatry for Students at ECSU

Students across North Carolina face significant pressure each and every day. We’ve funded a new partnership between ECU and ECSU to assure that students in Elizabeth City are getting the mental health services they need to thrive.

Learn more at mediacenter.bcbsnc.com

COVID-19 Support

The pandemic has shown us that our personal health is directly affected by the health of the communities where we live. We’ve been working to support our members through the challenges of a global pandemic, assuring that they have the resources they need to stay healthy and find care. We’re covering the cost of COVID-19 tests for members, improving our coverage of telehealth services, and providing all FDA and EUA approved COVID-19 vaccines for free during the public health emergency.

A blue sculpture sits in the foreground with a view of a road and large buildings in the background.

COVID-19 Support

Helping North Carolina Navigate COVID-19

During the pandemic, Blue Cross NC expanded coverage for care, and made investments in food security, community outreach, and crisis relief across the state to keep North Carolinians healthy.

Learn more at mediacenter.bcbsnc.com

A young African American mother wearing a camo mask helps her daughter put on her black mask.

COVID-19 Support

Comprehensive Support for COVID-19

Our communities are our top priority – that is why we’ve assembled resources to help keep you and your family safe through the pandemic. From COVID-19 testing to mental health support at home, we’ve got you covered.

Learn more at www.bluecrossnc.com

Supporting Communities

When it comes to health care, support can come in many shapes and forms. Blue Cross NC is on the ground in all 100 counties across North Carolina, meeting with local leaders and citizens, listening to their needs, and finding big and small ways to make a positive impact on community health.

Two men smile while sorting canned goods

Supporting Communities

Improving health through food security in NC

In North Carolina, 11% of households suffer from food insecurity. See how the Inter-faith Food Shuttle program is helping feed families and individuals in NC communities and nourish their physical and mental health.

Supporting Communities

Building bilingual behavioral health care in NC

North Carolina’s Hispanic youth face unique challenges when it comes to their mental health. By providing culturally sensitive, bilingual mental health services, El Futuro is giving them and their families a space to be heard, to find support, and to learn how to advocate for themselves.

Woman with blond hair wearing a red and black blazer stands outside in front of a brick wall with shrubbery.

Supporting Communities

Breaking the barriers to behavioral health access

We’ve partnered with the North Carolina ​Association of Free and Charitable Clinics to provide more mental health services in rural areas for those who are uninsured or underinsured.

Supporting Communities

Answering the call for care in rural communities

For North Carolinians living in rural areas of the state, access to health care is a serious problem—one that we’re actively addressing with long-term investments and partnerships with local leaders that allow us to be responsive to unique needs. Hear how we supported Jimmy Crayton, Chief of Police in Duplin County, as he went beyond the call of duty to provide care in his hometown.

Learn more at blog.bcbsnc.com

Blue Cross Blue Shield North Carolina logo and Farm Bureau Insurance logo

Supporting Communities

Blue Cross NC Expands Relationship with NC Farm Bureau Insurance

Blue Cross NC is the exclusive health insurance partner for NC Farm Bureau Insurance. The partnership between the two NC-based, not-for-profit insurers expands needed health resources to help residents in all 100 counties.

Learn more at mediacenter.bcbsnc.com

Gaile Osborne

Supporting Communities

NC mom helps fellow foster parents care for vulnerable children

Gaile Osborne wanted better care for her kids. Now, she’s working with Blue Cross NC to identify opportunities to bring more specialized services to foster families in Buncombe County and beyond.

A family of four wearing long sleeve shirts hugging on the beach.

Supporting Communities

Investing in children and families in foster care

Supporting the health and well-being of all North Carolinians means showing up for our most vulnerable. Blue Cross NC has invested more than $4.3 million in partnerships, programs and initiatives to help children, youth and families served by the child welfare system.

Learn more at mediacenter.bcbsnc.com