Affordable, Accessible, Life-Saving Heart Care
Washington’s Community Health Centers can help you track your blood pressure at home — and more
If you have high blood pressure, lowering it can make a big difference in your health. Community Health Centers (CHCs) are here to help. The centers offer many different health care services, and they’re expanding the ways they can help you manage your blood pressure. So now there’s even more reason to schedule your visit.
The nation’s first Community Health Centers, also known as Federally Qualified Health Centers, opened in 1965. Since then, they’ve expanded to provide affordable access to quality health care for 30 million people. In Washington state alone, there are over 350 centers, caring for an estimated 1.2 million people.
These centers help patients get connected to crucial primary care. They are affordable and accessible to everyone, no matter where in Washington you live, your immigration status, or the language you speak. If you’ve been delaying a visit to your doctor because of any of these reasons, your local CHC can help.
How to check your blood pressure at home
If you have high blood pressure and you don’t get treatment, it can lead to heart attack, heart failure, stroke, and kidney disease. Home blood pressure monitors can help you measure your blood pressure regularly and accurately.
Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, many CHCs have sustained or expanded their support to help people with high blood pressure.
For example, CHAS Health, Country Doctor, and Sea Mar have received federal funding to improve high blood pressure in their communities. Patients at these centers may have access to home blood pressure monitors, even if it is not covered by insurance. They can also get training and support on how to use the monitors and share the results.
International Community Health Services (ICHS) has partnered with the American Heart Association to make videos on how to check your own blood pressure at home. These videos are available in Mandarin, Cantonese, and Vietnamese. They can also connect you with Community Health Workers who speak your language and come from similar cultural backgrounds. For patients who don’t own a home blood pressure monitor, a lending library for monitors is available.
Just checking blood pressure alone isn’t enough, though. CHCs are making sure that patients share the readings at home with health care providers, and connect them to actions to reduce high blood pressure.
In rural areas, two CHCs are helping patients get their blood pressure to healthy levels with the help of nurses, Medical Assistants, and Community Health Workers.
- Family Health Center in Okanogan County is continuing to connect patients with home blood pressure monitors.
- Valley View Health Center in Lewis and Thurston counties plans to improve the ways that health care providers support patients with high blood pressure.
Getting your own home blood pressure monitor
These are just a few of the many initiatives to address high blood pressure. If you don’t see your CHC listed here, ask what they’re doing next time you visit. Everyone with high blood pressure benefits from lowering it to a healthy level. We encourage you to connect with your doctor or other health care provider to ask if self-monitoring can help you.
You can also ask your insurance company whether they cover the cost of a home monitor by calling the phone number on your insurance card. If you have a Flexible Spending Account, you can usually buy a blood pressure monitor with these funds.
For a list of monitors that have been validated for accuracy, visit the U.S. Blood Pressure Validated Device Listing online.
For more information about managing blood pressure, view the Department of Health’s Blood Pressure resource pages.
To learn more about CHCs in Washington, visit the Washington Association for Community Health, or the federal Health Resources and Services Administration.
More Information
Information in this blog changes rapidly. Sign up to be notified whenever we post new articles. For more information from the Washington State Department of Health, visit doh.wa.gov.
Questions about COVID-19? Visit our COVID-19 website to learn more about vaccines and booster doses, testing, WA Notify, and more. You can also contact the Department of Health call center at 1–800–525–0127 and press # from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday, and 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday — Sunday and observed state holidays. Language assistance is available.
