The Katy area is now home to the first out of the six advanced primary care medical centers coming to the Greater Houston Area. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas and Sanitas Medical Center hosted a grand opening for Sanitas Medical Center of Texas-Katy at 2610 N. Mason Road, Katy, which will service BCBSTX cardholders and accept self-pay patients and seniors with traditional Medicare coverage. “Health care has found a home in Katy partly because we are a growing area with a great quality of life,” said Katy Mayor Pro Tem Chris Harris. “Over 300,000 people call the Katy area home, and many of our residents and business leaders are Blue Cross Blue Shield cardholders.” The medical centers, scheduled to officially open Jan. 1, 2020, will offer primary and urgent care, lab and diagnostic imaging services and care coordination as well as wellness and disease management programs, all under one roof. “We’re excited to collaborate with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas to bring our high-value, patient-centered care to Texas,” said Sergio Martinez, global CEO of Keralty Group, the parent company of Sanitas USA. “We believe patients will appreciate the convenience our centers provide through expanded services, extended hours—including weekends—and mobile access to our doctors.” Bilingual doctors, clinical staff and BCBSTX customer service representatives will be on-site to help members answer questions related to health insurance, including enrollment, Medicare and billing. “Health care is terribly confusing,” said Texas Market President Robert Morrow, who is also a family physician. “Having the ability to make sure we are servicing our communities in both English and Spanish is critically important, particularly in a region with a robust Latino population.” The Sanitas Medical Center and BCBSTX partnership is working towards opening a total of four medical centers in the Dallas area, as well, a BCBSTX spokesperson said. The first Dallas location opened in Richardson in April. “We’re opening sites in areas where there are a lot of people who are uninsured,” he added. Sanitas Medical Center originated in Colombia about 40 years ago, according to its website, and the health business group now serves over 800 cities across Venezuela, Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, the Philippines and the U.S. “We partnered with Sanitas to incentivize the physicians and staff to work towards better outcomes and appropriate care to drive down costs,” a BCBSTX spokesperson said. “Sometimes, that may mean different courses of treatment, different lines of testing and a lot of different things that, when packaged, the patients are receiving high-quality care at lower costs.”