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Our Highlights from the Year

Our Highlights from the Year

It’s hard to believe there are only three days left until the new year. Despite the unprecedented challenges of 2020, the support of our volunteers, donors, partners, and staff enabled Mary’s Center to adapt quickly to meet the needs of our region’s most under-resourced individuals.

Each of you enabled Mary’s Center to be a resource for our community, not only by providing excellent healthcare in a time of great need, but also by addressing our participants’ financial distress by connecting them with resources for food, housing, and other services. Together, we are ensuring that access to healthcare, education, workforce development, and social support remains a reality for all – regardless of ability to pay.

As the year draws to a close, we want to share our greatest achievements with you.

First Line of Defense Against COVID-19

When crisis hit the DC area, turning our back on our participants was not an option.

Knowing that the communities we serve are often neglected in a crisis, especially people of color, immigrants, and excluded workers, Mary’s Center jumped into action immediately. Since March, we have incurred significant unexpected expenses. In order to continue delivering quality and accessible care to all, we purchased an unprecedented amount of personal protective equipment (PPE), COVID-19 tests for the uninsured, cleaning supplies, and new laptops and extra bandwidth for expanded telework.

Additionally, thanks to your support, we:

  • Expanded our telehealth services to ensure continuity of care by conducting over 78,000 telemedical visits from March through December.
  • Assessed and tested over 10,000 individuals with COVID-19 symptoms
  • Distributed more than $2 million in direct relief funds from local governments and generous individuals to more than 2,000 families in dire need.
  • Met the increased need for mental health support by providing over 44,000 telebehavioral health appointments to our participants.

Bringing Dental Care to Maryland

This year, Mary’s Center brought dental care to Maryland for the first time. The new dental suite at our Silver Spring health center, made possible with support from the Robert I. Schattner Foundation, will allow us to serve nearly 3,500 participants a year.

A year of awards and recognitions

Here are some of the awards and recognitions we have received over the last 12 months:

  • Designated as a 2020 Leader in LGBTQ Healthcare Equality in the Human Rights Campaign Healthcare Equality Index.
  • Recertified as a Federally Qualified Health Center for three more years by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), verifying that we meet the highest standards set by the federal government.
  • Mary’s Center and Briya were named one of the Washington Post 2020 Top Workplaces, a recognition of the best places to work in the Greater Washington region.
  • Earned a 2020 Platinum Seal of Transparency from GuideStar by sharing both qualitative and quantitative metrics to help donors move beyond simplistic ways of nonprofit evaluation. 
  • Mary’s Center’s Behavioral Health Department was certified as meeting the highest performance standards by the Council on Accreditation (COA), the leading accreditation organization for human and social services providers in the country.

Our inspiring network of supporters

In response to COVID-19, Mary’s Center had to make the difficult decision to cancel our annual Golf Classic and Taste of Adams Morgan fundraisers. At the same time, we lost more than $1.2 million monthly due to canceled appointments and lower reimbursement rates for virtual appointments.

However, during this year of uncertainty, we have been comforted, encouraged, and humbled by the outpouring of generosity from you – our community. Thanks to your remarkable in-kind and monetary donations, our healthcare heroes had access to essential PPE and meals while they worked on the front lines to provide our participants with COVID-19 tests, emergency medical care, and urgent social support. We are also grateful for those who supported this year’s Virtual Gala, which raised more than $460,000 to help our resilient and diverse communities reclaim a healthy, prosperous future.

Although the fight to regain health, stability, and hope is far from over, your support has been a lifeline to us and to the communities we serve. Thank you!

Bringing the spirit of the holidays and the dignity of a meal to all.

A warm meal, a holiday toy, a community that cares. Our Thanksgiving Food and Holiday Toy Drives were a success!  Thank you to all the individuals and organizations that helped provide the dignity of a Thanksgiving meal to more than 300 families and over 1,000 toys to our Mary’s Center participants.

THANK YOU!

Our community is stronger together. We are so grateful for your generosity this year. Please remember that Mary’s Center is also here for you, in whatever ways you or your friends and family need – with appointments on the phone, online, or in person.

We look forward to continuing our collaboration in 2021 to help even more families regain stability through access to quality healthcare, education, and social services.