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DENTAL CLINIC UPDATE
Wednesday, July 16th, 2008 -- 1:07 pm
Posted by Riley Hebert-News Director
Efforts to bring a dental clinic for disadvantaged patients to Neillsville continue. The next steps: find a suitable location for the 10,000 square-foot facility and form a foundation to oversee it.
The idea was spearheaded by Memorial Medical Center staff, who have observed an increasing number of patients turn to the Emergency Room for dental care.
MMC has decided to partner with Marshfield Clinic's Family Health Center and the city of Neillsville on the project.
At the root of the problem: less-than-adequate government reimbursements.
"The dentist gets paid about .39-cents on the dollar of their costs to see Medicaid or low-income people," explains MMC administrator Scott Polenz, "For the most part, they can't do that."
The proposed facility will be a Federally Qualified Community Dental Clinic, which means it will be reimbursed their costs for low-income patients.
The yet-to-formed, 7-member foundation will include MMC board members, a physician, and community members. One of its first tasks will be to work with the city and the Family Health Center to find a good location.
"We'll all sit down and determine where is the best spot for this," Polenz says, "A lot of that has to do with our responsibility to taxpayers and these patients. We have to find the most cost-effective place to build this dental clinic."
Retrofitting an existing building is also a possibility, and Polenz acknowledges the empty administrative building at the old Sunburst Youth Homes property is one of only a handful of sites being considered.
If all goes as planned, the facility will open in July of 2009.
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