The Georgia Health Care Association (GHCA) is Georgia 's leading long term care organization. Whether you work in a skilled nursing facility, a sub-acute center, a SOURCE agency or another long term care setting, our organization intends to serve you and thousands like you who share the public's trust in caring for our most vulnerable citizens. We at GHCA understand the challenges our members face in providing the best possible care for older, sicker patients many of whom have cognitive and physical challenges.

We are privileged that you are part of the GHCA team. We continue to work to achieve stable funding from Medicare, Medicaid, home and community based sources to enhance quality, and better meet the needs and desires of all long term care consumers and their families and loved ones. With the help of all of our members, we will work hard to influence policymakers to do the right thing for the frail, elderly and the disabled that we serve.

This year, under new leadership and a new Board of Directors, we will continue to assess how we serve and communicate with our membership and how we relate to other stakeholders. Thanks to all of our leaders, our staff and most importantly, our members, we have made significant and meaningful changes over the past year. We welcome the energy, the enthusiasm, and the ideas the new leaders bring to our Association. The four major areas of concentration this next two years will be in Diversification, Payment for Services, Legislative and Policy, and Quality Improvement.

Georgia has much to be proud of regarding the success of the DCH/GHCA/MyInnerView quality improvement program now going into our fourth year. This work provides a foundation from which we are moving forward. This year, GHCA, in cooperation with many other stakeholders, is launching an unprecedented campaign to accelerate quality performance in Georgia 's long term care profession. Advancing Excellence in Georgia's Nursing Homes is our theme and we are all committed to working together to achieve a single set of well defined goals. None of this would have been possible without the commitment of our leadership and membership.

Thank you for your continuing affiliation with the Georgia Health Care Association. We truly value your membership and your commitment to quality long term care services in Georgia and the nation. We are intensely proud of the work you do each day in caring for the frail and sick Georgians. You have demonstrated that we are all in this together and that when we act with one voice, we can meet any challenge.



Fred A. Watson, President, GHCA