Monitoring the Health Care Safety Net

The health care safety net—the Nation's system of providing health care to low-income and other vulnerable populations—was recently described as "intact but endangered." The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the Health Resources and Services Administration are leading a joint initiative to monitor it. The goal is to help local policymakers, planners, and analysts monitor the status of their local safety nets and the populations they serve. Strategies include providing baseline data and a set of tools that enable monitoring of the capacity and performance of local safety nets. Start with the Fact Sheet to become acquainted with the data available and click on the state, city or county information that you would like to monitor.