SUBMITTED NEWS RELEASE
On April 13-14, hundreds of volunteers reached nearly 400 residents of Lyon, Storey and Mineral Counties and brought free medical, dental, vision and behavioral health care services with an estimated value of over $300,000. The volunteers, along with dozens of groups from throughout Nevada, worked together to make the Medical Outreach Response Event (MORE) a success.
Healthy Communities Coalition of Lyon and Storey plans to hold the event again in March 2013 and hopes to have even more dentists and physicians as volunteers.
The estimation of $300,000 in health care services given at the MORE event doesn’t account for the long-term savings that will occur as a result of preventing crisis health care situations and connecting participants to help through the state of Nevada’s Office for Consumer Health Assistance, Access to Health Care Network and other groups.
Organizers interviewed hundreds of participants and volunteers at the event, and the recurring theme was that the state of health care needs to change, and licensed health care professionals should be allowed to cross state lines to provide humanitarian aid at events like MORE within the United States. Some of those interviews are contained in three short films:
http://www.youtube.com/user/HealthyCommunitiesNV
Summary of services at MORE:
- 150 families went through medical systems counseling to refer them to care they qualified for and/or reduced cost prescription drug programs
- More than 320 vaccines were given
- 206 people had dental services including cleaning and other services
- About 170 teeth were extracted
- 230 had vision screenings and about 200 received eye glasses or vouchers for glasses
- 31 were screened for behavioral health
- 37 had chiropractic adjustments
- Nearly 400 viewed the health fair information area
- 25 were tested for HIV
- 108 had their glucose tested
To volunteer, or for more information about the event, including complete data reports on the event and descriptions of the health care access gaps in Nevada, please call Healthy Communities Coalition director Christy McGill at (775) 246-7550.
For detailed data on Nevada and health care, see the 2011 Nevada Rural and Frontier Health Data Book at this link:
