Health center cuts the ribbon on remodeled, expanded dental clinic
By Brandy Nance (Contact)
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Flint Hills Community Health Center had a lot to celebrate Wednesday — National Community Health Center Week and the opening of the newly remodeled dental clinic.
The health center celebrated with a ribbon cutting and a program to honor the completion of the dental clinic remodeling. Lougene Marsh, executive director of the community health center, said National Community Health Center week offered the perfect opportunity to showcase the dental clinic expansion.
The remodeling, which will turn the dental clinic into a dental hub, also will allow the center to add more counties to the area the dental clinic can serve. Marsh said that before the remodeling and expansion, the clinic could take patients from Lyon, Chase, Greenwood and Osage counties. The expansion will allow the center to accept patients from Morris, Wabaunsee and Coffey counties. The funding for the dental clinic expansion (remodeling and equipment) came from a $576,574 Dental Hub grant from the W.S. & E.C. Jones Trust. The first year of the grant will be used to extend the physical space and add four more operatories and remodel and equip the additional space. The Kansas Legislature appropriated money that helps support staff salaries, Marsh said.
Marsh told attendees at Wednesday’s reception that the Jones Trust has had a long-standing commitment to oral health.
“They were instrumental in proving funding for the expansion of the clinic,” she said.
Cathy Harding, executive director for the Kansas Association for the Medically Underserved, spoke during Wednesday’s program at the health center. Harding said she’s seen a lot of changes in the health center’s dental clinic and in the emphasis on oral health.
“Six or seven years ago, dental health at the time wasn’t acknowledged very much,” she said. “The mouth is not outside the body. It’s all together.”
Harding presented state representatives Peggy Mast and Don Hill with awards for their work in the area of public health.
“It’s an honor to be a part of the community health center,” Mast said. “It’s an example for the rest of the state.”
Hill agreed.
“We feel blessed that we have such great resources here in Emporia,” he said. “The (center) is a model that we looked at and will continue to look at.”
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