Welcome to National Health Center Week ...

The second week of August each year is dedicated to recognizing the service and contributions of Community, Migrant, Homeless and Public Housing Health Centers in providing access to affordable, high quality, cost-effective health care to medically vulnerable and underserved people in the U.S. This year's commemoration is especially important as we set our sights on the goals of our ACCESS for All America plan to serve 30 million people by 2015.

"America's Health Centers: Home of America's Health Care Heroes" is the theme for National Health Center Week 2008. It recognizes the vital role of health center providers in achieving the success of the health center mission. From primary care physicians, to behavioral health specialists, to nurses and pharmacists, nearly 40,000 health care professionals serve on the front lines each day in health centers.

This year's Health Center Week also sets aside two days to focus on special populations who are often left outside of the mainstream health care system. Health Care for the Homeless Day will be observed on Wednesday, August 13th, and the first ever Farmworker Health Day will be observed on Thursday, August 14th , 2008.

America's Health Centers serve 17 million people (including 925,000 farmworkers and nearly 940,000 people who are homeless) in 6,000 communities in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Guam.

We invite you to join in a weeklong celebration, August 10th - 16th , to focus the public spotlight on America's Health Care Heroes.