Department to establish; purpose.
1. The Department shall establish a program to increase awareness of health care programs for children and to encourage enrollment in such programs. The program must provide for the dissemination of information to the public relating to health care services that are available in this state to children who are under the age of 13 years, including, without limitation, information concerning:
(a) Federal, state and local governmental programs which provide health care services to such children;
(b) The requirements for eligibility to participate in such programs; and
(c) The procedures for enrolling children in such programs.
2. The information disseminated pursuant to subsection 1 must encourage the use of the programs identified pursuant to subsection 1 and must emphasize:
(a) The benefits of preventive health care services to the well-being of children; and
(b) The reasons that preventive health care services are more efficient in treating potential health care needs and are more economical than obtaining emergency health care services which are often required when symptoms of an illness are not promptly and properly treated.
3. The program must be designed to disseminate information using the most effective means available to the extent possible, including, without limitation, using:
(a) Words or graphics, or both, that promote understanding of the information by the intended audience, considering the average level of reading comprehension of and the language understood by the audience.
(b) Printed materials that may be displayed at or distributed to:
(1) Offices of the federal, state and local government that have contact with parents of children who are under the age of 13 years or direct contact with such children, or both, in the normal course of business;
(2) Schools attended by children who are under the age of 13 years;
(3) Public libraries;
(4) Providers of health care who provide services to children who are under the age of 13 years;
(5) Child care facilities that provide services to children who are under the age of 13 years;
(6) Organizations that provide community-based services to parents of children who are under the age of 13 years, or to such children, or both; and
(7) Any other person deemed appropriate.
(c) Radio, television and other electronic means.
Last modified: February 26, 2006